Post an explanation of at least two opportunities that exist for RNs and APRNs to actively participate in policy-making. Explain some of the challenges that these opportunities may present and describe how you might overcome these challenges. Finally, recommend two strategies you might make to better advocate for or communicate the existence

iCARE Model in Transforming Nursing Care

The Emergency Department (ED) is an infamously high-stress, high-pressure environment. Working in the ED involved increased callbacks on day-offs and significant burnout and fatigue. However, it remains a vital department where speedy and effective care delivery is done to preserve life and favorable treatment outcomes. A multidisciplinary team involved paramedics, nurses, advanced-level trainees, and medical and nursing students like myself. Effectiveness was ensured through proper communication and collaboration, ensuring that care was coordinated at every level of care. It ensured that care based on compassion, advocacy, resilience, and evidence-based care was provided to all patients. Compassion is necessary, a virtue, among healthcare providers and especially nurses. Witnessing suffering and pain at the ED evokes feelings that ensure they undertake measures to relieve suffering and promote quality of life. According to Savieto et al. (2019), the extent of compassion demonstrated by a nurse care provider is directly proportional to the quality of care provided to patients.

Compassion

Compassionate nursing ensures a high level of patient satisfaction, increased job satisfaction, and even better coping skills. It has worldwide implications for the quality of nursing care patients have access to. Failure to show compassion and empathy in care is frowned upon by patients. A significant amount of research studies have demonstrated that the experiences that most patients have with nurses in care settings are mainly unpleasant. A discrepancy between what nurses consider as crucial in satisfying the psychological needs of patients and their families, especially in the emergency setting, has been determined to be a barrier to compassion in care.

Further, compassion fatigue is another emerging consideration in compassionate nursing practice. The emergency room demands compassionate nursing care. It is here that patients and their family members meet the reality of what happened to them. The shock from the trauma of accidents, injury, and death, among others, lay bare in the emergency room. Compassionate nursing comes in handy through emotional support, reassurance, effective listening, detecting, and relieving any patient concerns.

Advocacy

Nursing advocacy is at the core of nursing practice. Nurses actively and instinctively advocate both in the legal and ethical aspects. It is achieved by ensuring patient autonomy, taking action on our patient’s behalf, and enhancing patient safety and quality of care (Nsiah, Siakwa & Ninnoni, 2019). The healthcare environment is complex and involves red tape and bureaucracies; therefore, continuous and active patient advocacy in policymaking is vital. Through multidisciplinary collaboration at the hospital facility’s ED, tools, worker aids, and strategic implementation of patient safety programs were developed.

Resilience

Resilience in nursing refers to the ability to persevere in the face of adversity, usually in highly stressful care environments such as working in the emergency department. There are no shorts of shortfalls in nursing practice. They include staff shortage, fatigue and burnout, overworking, bullying, decreased autonomy, and constant organizational transformation, negatively impacting nursing practice quality (Henshall, Davey & Jackson, 2020). Therefore, there is a need for resilience building. This was achieved in the ED through sharing personal resilience strategies, detecting and eliminating triggers, and building each other’s strengths.

Evidence-based Practice (EBP)

Insufficient multidisciplinary collaborations to help promote evidence-based practice is a barrier to achieving the full scope of nursing practice. EBP is the transformation of new and existing knowledge into everyday practice to improve the quality of care. Application of EBP in a collaborative environment involves suggesting changes to increase efficiency and safety. Ensuring that every member of the multidisciplinary team is informed of the changes determines its success.

Summary

An effectively working multidisciplinary team ensures a practical ED. The iCARE model provides a framework for care improvement and enhancing collaboration in the clinical setting. Successful implementation of the iCARE model is dependent on focusing on the healthcare team working at the point of care at the time. Therefore, cooperation is vital to achieving the full extent of the scope of registered nursing practice.

References

Henshall, C., Davey, Z., & Jackson, D. (2020). Nursing resilience interventions–A way forward in challenging healthcare territories. J