Strengthening nurse-patient relationships to improve clinical health outcomes

Running Head: IMPROVING NURSE-PATIENT RELATIONSHIP

IMPROVING NURSE-PATIENT RELATIONSHIP 13

Improving Nurse-Patient Relationship

Introduction

The nurses from the major core health personnel in the health care system with their support being appreciated on different occasions. However, the relationship between the nurses and the patients is essential in every scenario. The relationship forms the comprehensive interaction between the nurses and the patients.

This research focuses on how the existing relationship between these individuals can be strengthened by improving the skills necessary to handle every character’s patients while striving to achieve the gold standard of treatment.

Nurses are charged with the sole responsibility to ensuring the continuity of the communication between them and the patients through literacy acquisition and the spread of impacts and importance of the relationship to the patients that will see the patients served diligently to satisfaction.

These relationship cues range from behavioral, technical, better communication skills, building partnerships in the treatment process, adherence to the patients’ medications, and psychological relevance.

The project seeks to tentatively analyze these relationship cues and their implications as far as health care provision is concerned and their ultimate influence on the patient’s health, and the overall influence on decision making.

Professional and competence skills

In providing care to their patients, the level of competence and the ability to practice medicine with decorum influences the nurse-patient relationship. Nurses should attend to the patients with the utmost practice of professionalism and with the efficiency they deserve. This factor greatly impacts the patient’s satisfaction, and the latter helps improve the relationship between the caregiver who is the nurse in this scenario and the patient.

The nurse is expected to have substantial knowledge about the patient’s illness and make appropriate treatment choice; this will assure the patient and boost the patient’s confidence. Strict adherence to the diagnostic and treatment procedures is necessary (Molina -Mula et al., 2020).

Upholding the patient’s privacy and dignity

A satisfied and happy patient has been treated with utmost respect and dignity by the health worker. Nurses are expected to maintain the patient’s privacy, keep their dignity intact, and maintain confidentiality at all costs. Patients often trust nurses with their vital information they consider private and confidential; therefore, the nurse’s role is to maintain this confidentiality to better the patient’s satisfaction and improve their relationship with their patients.

Chaperons are always recommended whenever a male nurse is to handle any female patient; this helps boost the patient’s confidence in the treatment procedure (Hartley et al., 2020). The subsequent relationship between them improves that will even initiate a second visit to the same facility.

Provision of emotional support and show of empathy

Just before the onset of the treatment protocols, the exchange of pleasantries and the emotional support the nurse provides to the patient helps to build the relationship. A friendship between the nurse and the patient shows empathy, concern, and well-being assurance improves the patient’s confidence and a chance of life again to critically ill patients (Molina -Mula et al., 2020. The show of care, support, and comforting the patients improves their prognosis and the general procedural outcome.

The nurse must pay strict attention to the patient’s feelings and needs while seeking to find the solution to their bothersome illnesses, strengthening the bond and their relationship afterward.

Detailed information and communication

Communication is essential when dealing with patients. A nurse is expected to provide the patients with reliable information concerning their illnesses or their complaints; this helps minimize the anxiety and expels fear (Hartley et al., 2020). The qualitative research shows that the patients are more confident with the nurses that can adequately communicate to them in the language they best understand concerning their diseases, the management, and treatment option. It also helps to boost their optimism to healing and regaining their standard status of health. Patients that are well communicated to and well-informed show a greater improvement in their relationship with their nurses and even build a nurse-patient friendship after that.

Environmental factors

The environment and the health care facility helping to boost the patient’s experiences and gives them the best siren surrounding they need to interact and have a chat with their nurses, factors such as the cleanliness of the nurse, composure, and the services provided improves the relationship between the nurse and the patient even after the treatment is concluded, this gives the patient assurance that the nurse is diligent, smart and love the profession of health care provision (Konlan et al., 2021).

The nurse-patient interpersonal relationship

Satisfied patients often develop a personal relationship with the nurse even after the treatment; this is determined by the nursing skills displayed by the nurse to the patient. Nurses are expected to treat patients with the best personality ranging from building trust, showing concern and empathy, honest and adequate sense of humor; these factors boost the relationship between them and their patients, leading to the patient’s satisfaction (Molina -Mula et al., 2020).

Framework

This research study focuses on the data collection and analysis of the relationship between the nurse and the patient and the concepts that ought to be applied to improve the relationship and ensure continuity. The concepts revolve around diligence and competence, empowerment, strengthening the quality of the relationship itself, compliance to the patient’s needs, getting the patients empowered, and outlining the importance of this relationship in patient’s satisfaction and the ultimate prognosis of the patient (Hartley et al., 2020).

The ability to develop and seek consent from the patients before the beginning of the medical procedures and actively involve them in decision-making is considered compliance.

According to the professional standards and skills, the medical procedures’ patient-care system’s development has improved the nurse-patient relationship’s quality three folds.

The nurses’ difficulties in making decisions while courteously observing their needs based on the guidelines and principles make the core professional test to the nurse-patient relationship.

This literature seeks to identify the patient’s perception of the nurses and the standards of the medical profession and the strategic plans put in place to improve the quality of the nurse-patient relationship and the respect of the patient’s autonomy during decision making and identification of the treatment goals and plans in general (Konlan et al., 2021).

Research review of this article aims to prove that a good nurse-patient relationship improves the satisfaction from both parties and the patient’s role to submit to the question asked during involvement in decision making and the general implications of the health care practice.

Research hypothesis

The main questions of this research are; what are the roles of the nurses in improving the nurse-patient relationship?

What is the perception of the patients on the relationship that exists between them and the nurses?

What is the nurse’s perception of their relationship with their patient, and how these two parties’ involvement in decision-making and treatment? (Hartley et al., 2020).

What is the nurses’ experience when dealing with different patients, and how they managed a few limitations that arose from their interaction in a clinical setup?

Methodology

The research explores the relationship between the nurses and the patients and the strategic measures devised to improve this relationship in a clinical setup.

In this category of the research, certain essential parameters will be discussed, including the methods used in the data collection and the necessary ethics required to complete the research. The study’s proposed goal is under the topic (Hartley et al., 2020).

The proposed method to be employed in this study entails qualitative research that seeks to exhaust the existing relationship between the nurses and the patients and how the relationship can be improved or strengthened. This provided the reader with the systematic approaches and the experience the nurses have had with their patients within the clinical setups (Molina -Mula et al., 2020).

The research’s core intention is to involve the nursing staff from a reputable hospital within the region and a substantial number of patients, including in-patients and out-patients.

The appendices will be submitted to the hospital management that seeks permission to access the hospital setting to carry out the research; these letters seek to inform and get consent from the relevant authorities and inform them about the visit.

Once permission from the management is granted to access the hospital premises, a request will be made to the nurses and the patients in the form of a letter that cordially invites them to participate in the research study in which; the goal of the research will be explained to them, their impotence in participation in the study, their rights of consent to participate or decline (Hartley et al., 2020)., the confidentiality of the information they will provide the researchers with, contact details and the possible reward if there will be any.

The participants will then be provided with proformas to provide their consent and be given an adequate time of three weeks to decide their participation in the study regarding the prior invitation.

This set of groups planned for the interview will mostly comprise the internal medicine department team: the nurses and the patients altogether.

(Konlan et al., 2021). Further assessment of the nursing records will help the researchers identify these patients’ past medical history, how they were attended to, their satisfaction in the whole process, and their relationship with the nurses after leaving the clinical setup.

Plans for data collection and analysis

Interview with the nurses;

This interview projects 20 nurses, which; will be further subdivided into three categories.

1) Nurses with the minimum expected several work experiences within the hospital set up but are considered well equipped with the necessary information required for the study and are well endowed with the required professional skills for this hospital’s nursing work (Hartley et al., 2020). This group of nurses must be having a minimum of 5 years of work experience.

2) Nurses with the minimum stay within this clinical set up for 4 years and are considered to be well informed about the hospital’s services and the relationship that has so been created between the patients and other nurses (Molina -Mula et al., 2020).

3) Intern nurses and other colleagues voluntarily agree to participate in the research study and provide the study’s consent.

The nurses’ interview will comprise around ten open-ended questions, and every nurse gave about 1-hour to -1-hour and 30-minutes to answer the questions. The method of taking the data will be audio typing with permission from the nurses who are the participants (Konlan et al., 2021). However, the interviewers will be further educated on their rights to maintain their stand on the answers or right to withdraw their answers and possible termination of the interview process if they should feel it is necessary.

The interview will be carried out in private rooms during the daytime for five days.

Interview with the patients;

The patients selected for this study are from the internal medicine and therapeutics department; before the beginning of the interview, the patients will be educated on the need for their participation in the study and the need to provide honest answers to the questions (Gou et al., 2020), their rights to withdraw from the interview where necessary and the importance of the whole process.

Thirty patients are selected for this study and categorized under the following;

1) Patients with long hospital stay who have had maximum interaction with the nurses on several occasions within the hospital (Gou et al., 2020).

2) Newly admitted patients with minor illnesses but have had interaction with the nurses within the wards.

3) Patients who had been treated and discharged and still maintained a personal relationship with the nurses that attended to them.

The patients will be expected to interview questions in secluded and private rooms to maintain their responses’ privacy and confidentiality.

Nursing records data review;

With permission from the management and the staff, the patients’ clinical records will be reviewed to identify the clinical procedures done while asking the patient to grade the satisfaction and the relationship with the relevant nurse that provided the care; consideration will be made to protect the privacy and the confidentiality of the patient’s information and the data details. Selection of key statements relevant to the study’s topic will be made (Hartley et al., 2020).

Ethical considerations;

This research will uphold the hospital data’s privacy and confidentiality, information received from the nurses, patients, nursing records, or any hospital staff.

This study is subject to approval by the Ethics committee for research and under authorization by the hospital staff (Molina -Mula et al., 2020).

The participants’ rights will be maintained and their interventions respected; the modes of taking and storing data have to be accepted by all participants in the study.

Data analysis;

The data analysis’s sole goal entails providing the results’ basic structure and providing the research data’s gross meaning and identity.

Soon after the interview process concludes, the data will be synthesized, followed by interpretation and provision of the descriptive meaning to the data collected (Konlan et al., 2021). Clarifications will be sought to exclude discrepancies that might have a chance of occurrence; further, re-reading the obtained results will avoid the chance of the information reoccurring.

The analyzed data will be put into appropriate use to exhaust the factors that affect the nurse-patient relationship and the measures needed to be implemented to strengthen the relationship.

Limitations of the research

However, the limitations likely to be experienced are that; this study focuses on just one particular hospital. The information achieved cannot generalize the nurse-patient relationship findings in other hospitals (Hartley et al., 2020).

Also, this qualitative research makes it impossible to achieve neutrality and is not précised to the study, thereby limiting its accuracy.

Budget

The overall cost of this research is estimated to be as follows.

Expenses

Cost in dollars

Calls and internet charges

180

Traveling expenses

120

Stationary

84

Computer services

358

Library services

48

Meals and refreshments

60

Photocopying and printing services

120

Stamps and office materials

24

Recording devices

95

Miscellaneous

238

Total

1,327

Conclusion

In conclusion, this research literature review has exhausted the possible measures that will be needed to investigate that promotes and improves the relationship between the nurse-patient relationship. This research study proves the validity of these factors while outlining the possible shortcomings and ethical considerations while dealing with the patients in a clinical setup; this relationship is an essential tool in grading the nurses’ professional skills and improving patient satisfaction and prognosis.

Appendices

Appendix 1.

A letter to the hospital research and Ethics committee

Name __

Address _

University

Research and Ethics committee

Hospital name__________

Address __________

Date _______

RE: Qualitative research on the nurse-patient relationship

Dear sir/madam

I am a final year student taking a bachelor degree in nursing; concerning the topic above, I am this seeking the mandate and the permission to take qualitative research in the nurse-patient relationship and ways to improve it in this hospital of choice, which is a requirement as far as my career is concerned.

I hope to use the nurses and the patients for this study and any other relevant health caregiver.

Looking forward to receiving feedback from you.

Thank you

Yours sincerely

Name _____

Signature ________

Appendix 2.

A similar letter to the nursing director

CC: Department of internal medicine and therapeutics.

Appendix 3.

Nurses and the patient’s consent form

I___________ have read carefully and understood the letter inviting me to take part in the research study titled nurse-patient relationship improvement.

I have thought about it adequately and understood the study’s scope and consent to participate in the study.

Participant’s signature________

Date _______________