Nursing Theories

Question 1

Environmental Theory - Florence Nightingale

Answer 1

Nursing as the act of utilising the environment of the patient to assist them in their recovery - i.e. placing the patient in the best condition for nature to act upon them.
Five environmental factors:
1. Fresh air
2. Pure water
3. Efficient drainage
4. Cleanliness/sanitation
5. Light/direct sunlight.

Question 2

Transpersonal Caring - Jean Watson

Answer 2

Nursing is concerned with promoting health, preventing illness, caring for the sick and restoring health. Caring is central to nursing practice and promotes health better than a simple medical cure.
10 Carative factors:
1. Humanistic-altruistic system of values
2. Instillation of faith-hope
3. Sensitivity to self and others
4. Helping-trust relationship
5. Promotion/acceptance of expressing positive/negative feelings
6. Systematic use of creative problem-solving caring method
7. Promotion of transpersonal teaching-learning
8. Providing supportive/protective/corrective mental, physical, social and spiritual environment
9. Assistance with gratifying human needs
10. Allowance for existential-phenomenological spiritual forces

Question 3

Novice to Expert - Patricia Benner

Answer 3

1. Novice - no previous experience making them struggle to decide which tasks are most relevant to accomplish - e.g. nursing student.
2. Advanced beginner - some real-world experience enables them to identify the recurrent component in relation to rules and guidelines, may require supportive cues.
3. Competent - two-three years experience enables them to see actions in terms of goals/plans and works in an efficient, organised/coordinated and confident manner.
4. Proficient - learned what to expect in situations, uses pieces evidence (i.e. maxims) that provide directions to see a situation as a whole
5. Expert - intuitive grasp of each situation, thinks before acting and understands what needs to be accomplished, beyond rules, guidelines, and maxims

Question 4

Self-Care Theory - Dorothea Orem

Answer 4

Nursing as the act of assisting others in the provision and management of self-care to maintain or improve human functioning at the home level of effectiveness.
Three interrelated theories:
1) Self-care theory - actions independently undertaken to maintain and enhance wellbeing.
2) Self-care deficit theory - individual’s inability to perform self-care activities arising from temporary limitations or gradual decline.
3) Nursing systems theory - wholly compensatory, partially compensatory and supportive-educative.

Question 5

Theory of Goal Attainment - Imogene King

Answer 5

The nurse and patient communicate information, set goals together, and take actions to achieve those goals in the context of an interpersonal relationship that allows a person to grow and develop. The factors that affect the attainment of goals are roles, stress, space, and time
The patient is a social being with three fundamental needs:
1. Health information
2. Care that seeks to prevent illness
3. Care when unable to help oneself

Question 6

Transcultural Nursing - Madeleine Leininger

Answer 6

Transcultural nursing as an area of study and practice focused on comparative cultural care values, beliefs and practices of individuals/groups. Aims to provide culture-specific and universal nursing care practices to promote health/wellbeing and assist others to face illness and death in culturally-meaningful ways.

Question 7

4 Common concepts

Answer 7

1. The person
2. The environment
3. Health and illness
4. Nursing practice

Question 8

Why did nursing theories develop?

Answer 8

1. To advance nursing as a scholarly/scientific profession
2. To improve delivery of nursing care