The Role of Patient Assessments in Nursing

Summary

In this video, a member of our clinical team discusses the critical role of patient assessment in nursing practice in the US. Assessment is the foundation of the nursing process, essential for accurate diagnosis, planning, and treatment. Nurses must interpret assessment findings, advocate for patients, and communicate effectively with the healthcare team. Key aspects include using essential equipment, accurate documentation, interpreting lab values and imaging reports, and ensuring proper use of PPE.

Transcript

I am joined by one of my colleagues. He's actually a nurse here, and he works on our clinical team, at Health Carousel International. His name is Ryan Kiefer.

Ryan, do you wanna introduce yourself? I know you have, a fun topic to go over today.

No. Absolutely. Thank you, Erica. I wanted to touch base and talk about some of the clinical aspects of, you know, working in the United States and how we can, you know, help to support everybody as they embark on their transition of their nursing practice to the US.

And so, you know, really, what we wanted to focus in on today is the assessment aspect of nursing, right? So your your patient assessment skills and how important those are and how impactful they are to positive patient care outcomes.

And so the assessment, as you know, with the nursing process is the first step, and the rest of the nursing process doesn't happen, unless you have that assessment completed at first. And so, you know, with that comes the skills and knowledge and practice you need to be able to perform an accurate patient assessment.

You know, it's really important, and and we focus in a lot on preparing our nurses for the assessment aspect of their skills when they get to the US because, you know, it's it's responsible for collecting that real time data and applying the nurse's critical thinking skills. So not only, do the clinical skills you use come into play, you know, assessing the patient, but also your critical thinking skills, understanding what it is that you are assessing, so then you can put into place the right diagnosis, planning, implementation, and then follow-up evaluation further on in that patient's care.

And so as you gather that data, the stage can be you know, significantly impact, the patient's health outcomes. So aside from evaluating the exact condition that prompted that patient to seek medical care, throughout the assessment, you're also looking and possibly identifying other aspects, and care needs that that patient has that they may not have presented with originally.

And so they, you know, finally, you know, kind of just sum that up, right:

So the nurse's role in the United States, is to be an advocate for their patient.

That not only is, you know, speaking on behalf of the patient for the concerns that they have, educating them and providing them and their families education on the care that they're receiving, and and looking out for their best interest, but also, you know, understanding what it is that you're you're seeing in the patient, recognizing the changes in care that they need, and communicating these effectively to the physicians and the rest of the care team, which could include respiratory therapists, medical technicians, speech therapists, occupational therapists along the way, the nurse is advocating those things too and communicating those to those professionals to continue to progress and advance the patient care.

And so some of the equipment, that you might encounter, that is definitely good to review and be familiar with as you start your career here in the United States, would include things like a stethoscope, you know, really understanding the the functions and purpose of a stethoscope, pen lights for your neurochecks, manual blood pressure cuffs, automated blood pressure cuffs, automated vital sign machines where you can then obtain, you know, pulse oximetry, patient temperatures, thermometer probes rectally.

And then the big one is, you know, charting, right? So part of your assessment, right, is then documenting everything that you've assessed and gathered for that patient's care. And so without any documentation, nobody really can share that information across the the care team, which again makes up your nurses, physicians, and therapists.

And so understanding the documentation best practices, is extremely important. So whether that's electronic medical records, you know, good old fashioned pen and paper documentation and charting, it's important to to really know that that is a large time consuming portion of what nurses do, aside from the direct patient care, but also ensuring that all of their assessment data that they've been collecting through a twelve, ten hour shift is being accurately documented so that the physicians and all the other professionals can then go in and see, track and trend, and ensure that the patient care that's being delivered is is being prescribed effectively.

And then finally, a huge part of the assessment process is the interpretation of different values, whether it's laboratory values, so being aware and focused in on what the normal lab values could be for, patient's blood work, urinalysis, ABGs, the different lab values that are collected, but then also EKGs and imaging reports, really being familiar with the vocabulary and rate and rhythm interpretation if that's something that is in your specialty of nursing, whether that's telemetry nursing, step down, you know, critical care or emergency. Understanding those values is extremely important as well.

And then finally, your protective, equipment. Right? So understanding your use of the PPE and ensuring that while you're assessing the patient and providing your care that you are doing it safely, and in accordance to whatever PPE is required for that patient.

And so it's never too early to really start preparing for your journey to the US, you know, undertaking a lot of the roles and responsibilities, that US nurses take on and and sort of bear the weight of in their practice every day.

And so through that, Health Carousel has developed our transition to practice curriculum. So all of the, online available coursework that gets assigned to you prior to your arrival includes courses and trainings that are designed to focus in on not only assessment, but other important nursing skills and practice to help familiarize you with the US health care environment.

And so we always strongly encourage to take advantage of that online learning management system, but not only through the assigned curriculum and your to do items, but when that gets assigned to you, you also have access to the entire library of course and content through that online learning management system. And so there's over ten thousand courses focusing on nursing and health care skills and practices to help you familiarize yourself with the US health care environment.

And so we really encourage taking advantage of that. It's a great place to gain CE credits for licensure and licensure renewal, here in the United States, but also just good refreshers with the the best practice updates, of any of the skills that you need that are applicable to your, nursing profession and the specialty where you operate.

And so but not only that, you always have myself and our other internal clinical team here. We are your clinical support members, your advocates, your career coaches. And so if you ever have any questions, you know, as you prepare to make your journey here to the US with any of the trainings that you're completing, any of the information that you're reviewing, or even once you arrive, you know, certainly you can reach out to your advocate, your IES, your IDA, whoever it is that you you are working with with Health Carousel, and just say "hey. I would love to speak to your clinical team. I have some questions related to, my online trainings or just some clinical questions that I would love to review", and we can certainly jump on a call to see how we continue to support your journey because, you know, I've worked here at Health Carousel for over six years now. And so I have focused a lot of that time supporting our international nurses that we have here. And so I love the journey that everybody come you know, just embarks on in coming to United States. And, you know, I know it's a lot. I can't even imagine, you know, kind of going through that myself. And so, we wanna be a support to you and and make sure that at least the clinical transition of your practice goes as smooth as possible. So, if you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out. I look forward to being here to support you through your entire journey.