Abstract
Nursing is a discipline that is constantly evolving and requires professionals to use their skills and evidence-based practices to achieve good outcomes in their responsibilities. Knowledge deficiency is one of the major challenges that affect outcomes attained by nurses in their duties in different healthcare settings. In addition, nurses are required to deal with high levels of pressure in their work which may expose them to high levels of stress. An appropriate healthcare environment finds out the needs of various professionals that work in different healthcare settings and how they can be met to ensure they attain positive outcomes in their duties. Different research studies have discussed theoretically as well as practical issues that affect nurses in their duties in different healthcare environments.
Introduction
Nurses perform critical roles in different healthcare settings where they are employed. In many instances, nurses are expected to work under a lot of pressure due to the demanding nature of their responsibilities. This may cause some nurses to be affected by job-related stress because they may not be in a position to cope with the daily challenges they face in their workstations. Therefore, managers of healthcare systems need to be aware of various issues that determine the manner in which nurses perform their duties in different environments. This paper will review different published articles that speak about coping strategies that can be used to manage job-related stress among nurses.
Discussion
Nurses are expected to be accountable to various professional codes of conduct in their workstations and this exposes them to a lot of pressure. Since they are required to adhere to evidence-based practice in their dealings, nurses face a lot of challenges that expose them to a lot of stress at the workplace (Thorne & Sawatzky, 2014, p. 5). More needs to be done to transform decision-making processes that nurses use to carry out different duties in their workstations to enable them to achieve good results. Since they operate in a dynamic environment, nurses need to be made aware of specific priorities they need to observe to ensure they achieve high levels of performance in their duties (Nairn, 2012, p. 8). In addition, face various challenges that make it difficult for them to interpret and use information recorded in healthcare settings to improve the quality of outcomes they attain.
Nurses in different healthcare settings face difficulties in interpreting theoretical evidence that can help them perform their duties better. Nurses are exposed to disciplinary standards which encourage them to focus on particular issues that relate to service delivery and this makes them ignore other important facts (Thorne & Sawatzky, 2014, p.7). Nurses always face a dilemma whenever they are required to make important decisions that are directly related to their duties. In many instances, they are expected to be open-minded to previous solutions that were used in cases similar to the ones they are facing in their working environments. However, this requires them to apply their skills beyond what they feel is rationally acceptable in the healthcare context. As a result, the increased focus on evidence-based practice in many healthcare settings has continued to subject nurses to a lot of stress which is not good for their wellbeing.
In the modern socio-political environment, nurses need to be well equipped to respond to different types of bioterrorism threats they are likely to be exposed to in their duties. Previous anthrax attacks in the U.S. and the spread of other contagious diseases in various areas have made healthcare officials understand the importance of equipping frontline health workers with appropriate skills (Smith & Hewison, 2012, 2598). Therefore, they need organizational as well as clinical skills to help them execute their functions more effectively to prevent the danger caused by a bioterrorist attack from spreading. Moreover, current research does not address the ability of nurses working in different healthcare settings to deal with various factors that they get exposed to during bioterrorism threats. In the long run, the findings in the study indicate that many nurses feel that they will not be in a position to respond effectively to a bioterrorist threat in their workstations.
Some large hospitals such as John Hopkins are streamlining their IT processes to increase the productivity of their staff. The hospital uses single sign-on methods to allow various professionals that work there to access different types of information and data that are beneficial to their performance. This has led to efficient work systems in the organization to be utilized to achieve good results from its internal processes. In the past, individual login usernames and passwords slowed down the work process and compromised the hospital’s data security (Hanover, 2012, p. 3). A lot of time was wasted on password resets and this strained the operations of key IT personnel in the hospital. They were required to conduct constant improvements on the whole IT systems found in the hospital. However, the hospital has been able to streamline its important IT functions which allow multiple users to obtain information in specific locations they are working.
The quality and credibility of research need to be enhanced to ensure findings that are realized are appropriate. A researcher needs to use valuable qualitative research by using analytical formats that are able to reveal relationships between various concepts more effectively (Patton, 1999, p. 1190). A credible researcher needs to use high-quality analytical processes which organize the data obtained in logical formats which help to advance knowledge to different people that are likely to depend on a particular study. Moreover, they also need to balance between the data they obtain and the methods of analysis they use to make it appropriate for specific audiences that rely on the final findings. Ultimately, a researcher needs to ensure the quantitative and qualitative techniques he uses to compare and analyze data should help him solve different problems that are caused by limited knowledge in a particular subject.
The use of qualitative methodologies in social sciences will have a major impact on results obtained from qualitative research processes. Many researchers fail to adhere to high standards of practice whenever they conduct social research using different qualitative methodologies. In many instances, such researchers are discouraged from adopting new concepts of research that do not conform to the skills they possess making them unable to achieve high-quality outcomes in their engagements. Therefore, they need to go beyond traditional concepts that underpin qualitative research by undertaking rigorous strategies that address what they intend to cover and how they are going to highlight it in their findings ( Lietz, Langer & Furman, 2006, p. 443). They also need to challenge existing bodies of knowledge by using rigorous techniques which make it easy for them to convey their ideas to other people that have an active interest in what they are researching. This will make them study and analyze different types of data they gather to enable them to come up with new meanings.
Participants in a research study need to understand the relevance of meanings obtained out of different complex processes in a research study. They need to explore different ideas that enable them to come up with more appropriate findings from their work. As a result, they will be able to satisfy the interests and expectations of their specific target audiences who rely on the information published from different research studies ( Lietz, Langer & Furman, 2006, p. 446). They also need to adopt new methods of exploring complex phenomena which cannot be measured easily using traditional approaches. As a result, they will be able to open up their minds further to understand specific factors that may have an impact on the way they perform their duties. Therefore, they can be able to reflect on the purpose they want to achieve from a particular study and how this purpose is likely to drive them to attain positive outcomes.
Effective leadership in healthcare settings results in good nursing outcomes in different areas. Healthcare managers need to reinforce safety practices in their internal operations to ensure patients receive high-quality results whenever they seek different types of services. Leaders in healthcare facilities must work harder to provide appropriate facilities that enable nurses to adhere to high-quality standards of care that satisfy patients’ needs (Wong and Cummings, 2007, p. 513). Transformational leaders are needed in healthcare to improve the quality of services that patients receive whenever they are attended to by nurses and other health professionals. In addition, such leaders encourage nurses and other health professionals to build appropriate relationships with their patients to encourage them to share information easily which can be used for different purposes (Boyle, 2004, p. 118). Therefore, some of the benefits which are likely to be achieved from good nursing leadership include; patient safety, patient satisfaction, reductions in complications and a positive working culture that focuses on high-quality outcomes.
Many research studies are required to measure up to unrealistic parameters which do not take into consideration other forms of inquiry that bring about quality results. Concepts such as trustworthiness, honesty and utility should be used to determine the validity of narrative research studies (Loh, 2013, p. 6). However, researchers of narrative studies need to understand the purpose of their studies and how it drives them to come up with high-quality studies. This will enable them to use narrative techniques to understand the complexities that are associated with human behavior. Therefore narrative research techniques should be combined with qualitative research methods to ensure the findings obtained are responsive to the peculiar situation being addressed by a researcher. As a result, this enables participants in a research study to establish a consensus regarding the way the data gathered is going to be analyzed to achieve the desired effect. In the end, this makes the findings obtained from a particular research process reliable because they address the needs of different target audiences.
Conclusion
In conclusion, nurses are influenced by various factors to achieve good results in different healthcare settings where they work. Healthcare leaders need to develop positive relationships with nurses and other stakeholders to improve the quality of outcomes attained by their health facilities.
References
Boyle S.M. (2004) Nursing unit characteristics and patient outcomes. Nursing Economics. 22 (3), 111–123.
Hanover, J. (2012). Best practices: Single sign-on drives productivity, security and adoption when used with EHR at the John Hopkins hospital. New York, NY: IDC Health Insights.
Loh, J. (2013). Inquiry into issues of trustworthiness and quality in narrative studies: A perspective. The Qualitative Report 18 (65), 1-15.
Nairn, S. (2012). A critical realist approach to knowledge: implications for evidence-based practice in and beyond nursing. Nursing Inquiry, 19 (1), 6-17.
Patton, M.Q. (1999). Enhancing the quality and credibility of qualitative analysis. Health Services Research, 34 (5), 1189-1208.
Smith, C. & Hewison, A. (2012). Are nurses prepared to respond to a bioterrorist attack: A narrative synthesis. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 68 (12), 2597–2609.
Thorne, S., & Sawatzky, R. (2014). Particularizing the general sustaining theoretical integrity in the context of an evidence-based practice agenda. Advances in Nursing Science, 37 (1), 5–18.
Wong, C.A., & Cummings, G.G. (2007). The relationship between nursing leadership and patient outcomes: A systematic review. Journal of Nursing Management, 15, 508–521.