Introduction
The modern healthcare system is constantly evolving, which leads to the need to develop new methods of providing medical care to the population. Today, it is important for patients to monitor their health, maintain it, and prevent various diseases throughout their lives. According to the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (2019), nurse practitioners (NP) make an emphasis on health management and disease prevention, but also have clinical experience in disease diagnosis and treatment (para. 2). A family nurse practitioner (FNP) is a specialized area of advanced practice nursing (ANP) that implies providing various healthcare services to all family members, regardless of their age. FNP has a wider practical spectrum from the education of patients about disease prevention to treatment of serious medical conditions.
FNP’s Impact
There are many benefits of NPs for both the healthcare system and patients. First of all, as highly qualified specialists, they can perform the same functions as physicians at a much lower cost. Thus, they can provide medical services under the supervision of physicians, which will reduce the workload of the staff (Loria, 2018). According to Barratt and Thomas (2018), another meaningful aspect is the patients’ level of satisfaction and enablement of FNP. The researchers applied a questionnaire intended to assess the expectation before the consultation and the fulfillment after it. Having contacted 71 adults, they reveal that the positive comments outweigh the negative ones (Barratt & Thomas, 2018). Patients appear to be predominantly satisfied by the quality of FNP consultations. Thus, family nurse practitioners are more personalized and provide long-term healthcare services for the whole family, which are beneficial for the quality and cost of healthcare.
Teamwork Concept
Teamwork is an everyday practice that is extremely important for FNPs. McInnes et al. (2015) conducted a literature review of CINAHL, Scopus, Web of Life, Cochrane Library, Joanna Briggs Institute Library of Systematic Reviews, and Trove. The results depict that the collaboration of FNPs with physicians, separations of duties, and coordination reduce the workload and increase patient satisfaction with the healthcare system (McInnes et al., 2015). Most FNP-patient contacts are prevention or supervision and management of uncomplicated conditions. FNPs are therefore needed to provide a more personalized approach to the patient (Barratt, 2018). While the physician is only interested in the patient’s health indicators, FNPs ask questions about everyday life as well, which makes patients feel more comfortable.
Questions
I would like to interview NAME, CREDENTIALS, POSITION on DATE. The list of questions I am planning to ask includes:
- What are the responsibilities of FNP?
- How are they different from those of a physician?
- What are the key skills of FNP?
- What development directions are available for FNP?
- Is it difficult to work with different groups of the population at the same time?
- What difficulties do you face in your daily work?
- Is it important for a nurse to make independent decisions?
- How many patients do you have at the moment?
- What certificates does a good FNP need?
- What medical needs do patients most often have?
Conclusion
Conducted research shows that NPs, especially FNPs, play an integral role in the modern healthcare system, and their number is constantly growing. By providing quality long-term healthcare for all family members, they help to decrease the workload of physicians and staff, resulting in lower costs. Such specialists are highly trained and can provide qualified assistance in case of need for diagnosis and treatment of various diseases as well. Significantly, FNPs provide more personalized attention to patients, which also increases their satisfaction with medical services. All of these factors have an extremely positive impact on the availability and quality of the healthcare system.
References
American Association of Nurse Practitioners. (2019). What’s a Nurse Practitioner (NP)? Web.
Barratt, J. & Thomas, N. (2018). Nurse practitioner consultations in primary health care: patient, carer, and nurse practitioner qualitative interpretations of communication processes. Prim Health Care Res Dev, 17(20), 1-8. Web.
Loria, K. (2018). The value of nurse practitioners to medical practices. Medical Economics. Web.
McInnes, S., Peters K., Bonney A., & Halcomb E. (2015). An integrative review of facilitators and barriers influencing collaboration and teamwork between general practitioners and nurses working in general practice. JAN: Leading Global Nursing Research, 71(9), 1973-1985.