Critical Thinking Skills Determining How

Critical Thinking Skills

Determining how best to apply knowledge and gain expertise in my current role as a Respiratory Therapist continues to be accelerated through the use of critical thinking skills in four areas. Using critical thinking to analyze, assimilate, and define frameworks for technologically-based learning has strengthened my credibility while communication, client customer, and detail skills have helped me better serve patients. This paper is an assessment of critical thinking skills and their contribution to my performance as a Respiratory Specialist.

Critical Thinking Skills Assessment

One of the most valuable critical thinking skill sets that I am working to improve and gain insights into is communication. I've learned in the past that communication with patients, doctors, medical staff and office staff always makes a difference where it matters most, and that is with the patient. Uses of communication styles, intonations, tone and dialect all may initially appear to support only procedural processes for running a clinic or medical office. Yet all of these areas of communication directly impact the patient's quality of care. It takes detail-based communication to make all of these ancillary conversations stay focused on the patient and the quality of their care. The critical thinking assessment of communication as the most important skill set is also clear when patients are asked to rate their levels of satisfaction with service.

The critical thinking that has lead to the development of more effective customer skills is also evident in not assuming that a given respiratory diagnoses develops the same and at the same rate within all patients, or that every patient has the same perception of their illness. For many, the focus is on creating a workable treatment plan based on solid diagnosis. Earning trust through consistency of communication, deciding when and if the level of detail about their diagnosis needs to be shared, and focusing on the patient through customer skills all when combined lead to a cured patient. Client or patient skills are an area that is the most rapid in learning from a critical thinking standpoint. To be effective as a Respiratory Therapist the client or patient skill set must improve with every interaction, because each patient is really a new learning experience as well in this area.