Family Nursing
When the family is taken as a context, nurses must consider the impacts that nursing interventions will have not just on their patients but also on their families. For example, the financial implications that healthcare interventions will have on a patient’s family should be taken into consideration, such as the ability of family members to purchase drugs. When a family member falls sick, the illness can exert not just financial strain, but other family members can also be affected emotionally (Kaakinen et al., 2018). In my nursing experience, for example, I once encountered a case where a patient had fractured led that needed to be operated on. The case involved a college student who was actively involved in athletic and sporting activities in school. Even though the patient was successfully operated on and admitted for some days, the patient, together with his family, had to make some changes in their normal lives. For instance, the family members have to take turns to care for the patient during his time at the hospital. The patient had difficulty standing for some time, something that affected him emotionally. As the nurse who was responsible for the patient, I had to educate the family members on some of the techniques they could use to cope with the situation and help their son overcome distress (Bastable, 2017). I advised them on the correct positioning of the leg, the importance of the patient maintaining cleanliness, and how to deal with the patient’s emotional frustrations.
Family as a Client
The entire family can also be considered to be a client during the recovery and treatment process. This consideration stems from the need to provide patients with holistic care. The goal of considering the entire family as a client is to assess the wellbeing of all family members and their ability to care for their patients while at the same time taking measures to ensure their wellbeing (Kaakinen et al., 2018). According to Kinchen (2015), holistic nursing involves the assessment of the emotional, physical and mental wellbeing of all family members with the aim of helping them adapt to changes in their family. One of the interventions I would use as a nurse under this context would be to offer guidance and counseling services to all the family members, such as therapy sessions for all family members individually and collectively. The role played by each family member in the patient’s recovery process is also important. For example, older siblings may be expected to play bigger roles than younger siblings.
Family as a System
When considering the whole family as a system, both the patient and other family members are treated as a single unit. This approach may require nursing professionals to consider interaction mechanists within the family system when developing intervention plans. For example, interactions within the family system may be guided by factors such as seniority, individual personalities, and the role played by each member of the family (Kaakinen, et al., 2018). Parents may, for instance, be more vocal when communicating with the rest of the family members, and they may use similar approaches to interact with sick members. From my nursing experience, younger siblings become fearful when older family members become ill, and they always prefer to be in the sick member’s room as a way of showing support. Other family members may express their apprehension through crying and other emotional approaches. Nurses must, therefore, try to understand interaction mechanisms within the family system when formulating intervention plans.
Family as a Component of Society
Under this context, nurses focus on how family members interact with their communities and the community resources available to care for their sick family members (Kaakinen et al., 2018). There is a time when one of my patients with lung cancer had his family bring over their community religious leader to come to pray for him. When the religious leader arrived, the family requested to have some privacy because they had to conduct some religious rites for the patient. As the nurse in charge of the patient, I knew that I had to respect the wishes of the patient and his family (Wu et al., 2016). We all have our own philosophical ideals that guide how we perceive life and how we approach matters to do with illness. Even though I understood the importance of separating my own beliefs from those of the patient, some of my colleagues were opposed to the idea because they perceived it to be a nuisance to other patients in the facility.
References
Bastable, S. B. (2017). Nurse as educator: Principles of teaching and learning for nursing practice. Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Kaakinen, J. R., Coehlo, D. P., Steele, R., & Robinson, M. (2018). Family health care nursing: Theory, practice, and research. FA Davis.
Kinchen, E. (2015). Development of a quantitative measure of holistic nursing care. Journal of Holistic Nursing, 33(3), 238-246.
Wu, L. F., Tseng, H. C., & Liao, Y. C. (2016). Nurse education and willingness to provide spiritual care. Nurse education today, 38, 36-41.