Write a reflection journal (250-300 words) to outline what has been discovered about your professional practice, personal strengths and weaknesses, and additional resources that could be introduced in a given situation to influence optimal outcomes. Each week there will be a specific focus to use in your reflection. Integrate leadership and inquiry into the current practice. Please make sure to address all areas in your writing.

Introduction

Nurses operate in settings that are characterized by challenges and complexities. The knowledge and practical experiences that I have amassed have enable me to overcome the complexities of health care systems in order to deliver services to patients and disadvantaged populations. Therefore, my experiences dealing with patients in different healthcare settings have provided me with opportunities to sharpen my professional and leadership skills. For a baccalaureate prepared nurse who anticipates working within a variety of settings, I can no longer afford to rely solely on my expertise in training, nor naïve optimism relating to collaboration and cooperation. Therefore, my learning and practical experiences have improved my ability to exercise leadership skills and contribute to the delivery of effective healthcare services to vulnerable groups. I have also been able to master the context of the healthcare system in which I provide my roles within the systemic structure of healthcare organization. Professional Capstone and Practicum Reflective Journal – Essay Assignment Paper.

New Practice Approaches

            The field of nursing has undergone major changes in the last decades. As a baccalaureate prepared nurse, I have learned to adapt to the changes in order to remain relevant in my effort to provide excellent services to patients. For instance, the continued use of evidence-based practice in nursing has been helpful to deal with health problems such as asthma, heart attack, diabetes, and obesity (Kristensen, Nymann & Konradsen, 2015). However, I have noted that such principles are not adequately embraced in care delivery and various practices abound. Within a traditional setting, patient safety studies have emphasized on evaluation of records to assess patient safety issues and to demonstrate that new practices will result in enhanced quality and patient safety. In particular, I have learned that nursing is a field that is rich with practices that recommend the use of empirical studies. Today, the nursing profession has offered major leadership for improving care through the utilization of findings in practice. Professional Capstone and Practicum Reflective Journal – Essay Assignment Paper.

The continued use of evidence-based practice in the field of nursing has revolutionized healthcare in various ways. Institutions of higher learning are increasingly recognizing the significance of this recent trend by introducing changes to their nursing programs in order to take into account evidence-based practice. As a student who pursues a degree in nursing, course materials that focus not just on improving the nurse’s entire knowledge, but also enhancing the significance of professional transparency is important. Such initiatives stress on the need for a nurse to make informed decisions and promote the consideration of the patients’ clinical, ethnic and spiritual backgrounds in relation to their health. The continued utilization of evidence-based practice in healthcare has also resulted in renewed focus on nursing studies. Although nursing programs may be comprised of at least a single or more courses associated with research, it is the task of learners to identify the significance of improving their skills. While I have observed that conducting research is not a regular endeavor for a nurse, it is important to understand issues that are relevant to new scientific evidences because this can provide major impacts on present and future career development. One popular evidence-based framework that is extensively used is the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) patient safety framework (Titler, 2008). This framework offers a safety research portfolio to health care delivery. Professional Capstone and Practicum Reflective Journal – Essay Assignment Paper.

Interprofessional Collaboration

            Health care tasks are often complex, multifaceted and burdensome for one professional to accomplish. A single problem may require the input of many groups of people drawn from different areas of specialty. This is one of the most interesting learning experiences that I observed. The role of nursing in leading change and advancing health cannot be questioned (Sullivan et al. 2015). Therefore, a nurse must understand that no single person can perform all these functions alone. Most significantly, I have learned that interprofessional collaboration goes beyond the practical healthcare setting to include educational contexts (Sullivan et al. 2015). Contemporary healthcare institutions need sophisticated organizational systems that depend on the interrelationship and integrations of many serv

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