Relief From Physical Discomfort

3 Outline how the factors relating to views on death and dying can impact on practice

As the world continues to evolve and change some things remain constant, including spirituality and religion. For centuries the belief in a higher power has guided man through the darkness darkest of times and has allowed us to evolve industrially as well as spiritually. Identifying spirituality, what it means to us, and our purpose is a lifelong project. Many fall short of identifying their true purpose while here on Earth, leaving the known world a source or dread and fret. For those that believe, life seems a bit more bearable, tolerable. Regardless of the God that believers pray to comfort can be sought in knowing that someone is listening.

Reed’s process model for clinical specialty education and psychiatric mental health nursing practice articulates relationships among the metaparadigm constructs of health, persons and their environments, and nursing activity (Smith & Liehr, 2014). Self-transcendence theory delineates specific concepts from Reed’s process model: constructs of health (i.e., well-being), a person (i.e., self-transcendence), and environment (i.e., vulnerability), and it proposes relationships among these concepts to direct nursing activities (1986, 1987). Reed (1991) and Coward and Reed (1996) have suggested nursing activities that facilitate the expansion of self-conceptual boundaries journaling, art activities, meditation, life review, and religious expression,

Nursing theory provides the framework for nursing practice and education, as well as future nursing research, which is essential to aid in the development of evidence-based nursing practice. Dr. Katharine Kolcaba’s comfort theory is a mid-range theory which promotes focusing on the holistic comfort needs of our clients. According to the comfort theory, an enhanced state of comfort improves healthcare outcomes and encourages clients to engage in behaviors that move them to a state of well-being (Kolcaba, 2003). Although medications and treatments are necessary to aid in restoring health to our clients, attentiveness to comfort promotes healing of the body, mind, and spirit, thereby significantly improving healthcare outcomes.

The need for spiritual care is clearly stated and identified for a holistic care; however, there are certain challenges that exist in providing spiritual care. It is believe that many healthcare providers including the doctors and nurses find it very challenging to initiate discussions or dialogs with patients touching aspects on their spirituality. Researchers had mentioned that, some nurses feel discomfort in having discussions on spiritual care as they do not see it as their scope of services or even as their role (Tiew & Creedy, 2010) . Some of the nurses find that such discussions are too intimate or interfering for them. A group of nurses stated that such discussions may possibly cause a degree of discomfort for their patients and in fact some patients or even the nurse herself may not have any personal spiritual or religious practices (Noble & Jones, 2010).

The following reflection piece is based on an event which I experienced during my internship placement. Johns model of reflection will be used for this assignment. The reflection is based around my own personal experience with a terminally ill patient. It focuses on one main issue, providing hope for patients and how I felt about it. it also discusses my feelings, the knowledge I had, my knowledge gaps and what I learnt through literature during my reflection. This assignment also covers the importance of hope for patients and the role hope plays in terminally ill patients. I will also discuss ways in which health professionals can foster hope in terminally ill patients.

These factors provide guidelines for nurse-patient relationship, and the goal of nursing to help persons attain a higher level of harmony within the mind-body-spirit, healing and health. The 10 caritas processes include the practice of loving kindness, equanimity, and belief system for oneself and other. She promotes cultivation one’s world spiritual practices, self-awareness, authentic relationship with the patient, and support patient’s expression of feelings. In addition, she encourage to creatively use the nursing knowledge as part of the caring process, engage in genuine teaching-learning experience, and create a healing environment at all levels. Watson believes that the nurse’s assistance with patient’s basic needs potentiate alignment of the mind-body-spirit. Lastly, she advocates to the opening and attending to spiritual, mysterious, and unknown existential dimensions of life, death, and

Spiritual histories are taken as part of the regular history during an annual exam or new patient visit, but can also be taken as part of follow-up visits, as appropriate. The acronym FICA, F- faith and belief, I-importance and influence, C-community, and A-address (The George Washington Institue of Spirituality and Health, n.d.). FICA Spiritual Assessment Tool serves as a guide for conversations in the clinical setting. This paper will analyze the interview assessment of a fellow coworker.

This essay will identify and describe the role of the writer as a practitioner of pastoral thanatology about the challenges faced by and support provided to the individuals and families, congregations and communities, and the policy makers and financial stakeholders. Families faced with EOL decisions leads to stress and depression. As a practitioner of pastoral thanatology, the pastor first evaluates the attitudes of the family as a whole as well as the individual. According to Kubler-Ross, "the majority of the patients know of their impending death whether they have been told or not."(234) The pastor not only attends to the needs of the family, but the practitioner has to consider the patient as an individual and what is best for them. The pastor has to remain a silent partner without compromising and passing judgment. The emotions must be discussed at the time the news of dying expressed because feelings turn to depression if not articulated. EOL affects everyone. Everyone takes the issue personally and lose sight of what is important, and that is the decision of the patient if he/she can grant a decision. The family has to know it is faith that comforts and keeps them as they press through the

Questionable methods of pain relief have been practiced on this planet since the stone ages. Luckily, modern advancements in medicine have granted us safe and quick options for relieving pain. Analgesics, often referred to as painkillers, are drugs that work by targeting the peripheral and central nervous systems. They are important because they are responsible for alleviating our headaches, body aches, fever, and inflammation. Non-opioid analgesics include acetaminophen and non- steroidal inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS) such as aspirin; they are typically used for mild pain. Opioid based analgesics such as morphine and codeine are used for chronic pain. NSAIDs function by inhibiting cyclooxygenase (COX) 1 and 2, which are enzymes that convert

Cultural influences play a substantial role in the direction, aspects, and characteristics of end-of-life care provided to older adults. Cultural competency (ability to understand both your own and others uniqueness) is necessary for providing therapeutic biopsychosocial-spiritual care. Cultural uniqueness can affect the following aspects of end-of-life care:

The first category is, the patient must be the one to invite the nurse to provide them with spiritual care and this could occur verbally or non-verbally. As stated earlier, Nurses can observe how their patients are feeling. While observing the patient, the nurse can read the situation, and if the patient looks like they are inviting for spiritual care, it is alright to proceed. The nurse should wait until the patient is ready to open the door. This is a time where giving them spiritual care can help themselves to understand what is happening physically. This usually happens when there is a change in lifestyle. The second category is where the nurse or the patient decides not to go into spiritual care. One might give a signal and the other will avoid it. For nurses, it is sometimes hard to engage spiritual care with their busy schedule, but that doesn’t mean the process stops there when there is no more engagement of the topic. The patient and nurse can both choose when to engage in spiritual care. The third category is the where spiritual care is actualized. A connection was made between the nurse and the patient. The nurse can then promote the patients’ self-reflection, connection with a god/high power, and the connection between patient and family. The patient will communicate and ask questions they don’t understand about their sickness and question the meaning it has in their life. Nurses can engage in connection with god/higher power when appropriate. They can adhere to rituals by praying and facilitating ritual rites. Connections with patient and family build a relationship that validates the meaning of the patient’s life and creates a greater

Through the centuries, people of different cultures have always been dying and their close relatives and friends were grieving for them. However, in this life situation different people may experience inner suffering of different degree. It is not a rareness that some of those can’t cope with their despair by themselves. Hence, they turn to professional help (Howarth, 2011, p.4).

The Age of Enlightenment shook the foundation of a world reliant on religion and its authority over the populace, who found security in being directed how to think and what to believe. During the period of enlightenment, science and technology quickly gained popularity, convincing the believers of their mind’s capabilities, teaching them to think for themselves, and essentially supplanting the church as the central authority. Where once spirituality performed a substantial role in the overall health of the patient, the practicality of science gave people something tangible to put their faith in and spirituality in healthcare was set aside and forgotten. It was not until recently that researchers began to question and study the importance of spirituality in the healthcare environment, and

The involvement of multidiscipline in the education of spiritual care for student nurses was outlined in two studies (Tiew et al. 2012, Cooper et al. 2013). Tiew et al. (2012) used a quantitative- descriptive, cross sectional design and Cooper et al. (2013) used quantitative and qualitative articles for their literature review. Reflection where students could contemplate and discuss together with teachers and nurses, and possibly chaplains from clinical rotation, is also reported to provide affirmation and support to students (Pesut 2008a, Mitchell et al. 2006). In Tiew et al (2012) study the findings pointed to the possibility that participants recognised their limitations and comfort level to provide spiritual care and viewed a multidisciplinary