Roles of Nurses in Health Assessment

Posted by emerjoytvale on August 13th, 2010

ROLEs OF NURSES IN HEALTH ASSESSMENT

Health assessment is a very crucial step in the health examination.  Assessment is to gather information about a patient's physiological, psychological, sociological, and spiritual status. As a nurse, we should be careful in taking the nursing history of the patient, either in a comprehensive or in general patterns as the situation calls. After that, a thorough physical assessment must be done in an orderly manner. Then, the nurse prepares the patient for the diagnostic examination. Above all, we must not forget the hallmark of the nursing accountability, PROPER DOCUMENTATION. We must record all the data, either subjective or objective accurately, completely and realistically.

Health assessments are performed by nurses in a variety of settings, including at health areas, in the community, and at schools and everywhere. It involves interviewing a patient, inspecting and observing her body and actions, palpating and percussing parts of her body and even auscultating sounds. Different roles of nurses can be seen in the following.

Data

Health assessments are used by nurses to gather information about a patient's condition. These data are used to formulate a nursing care plan for the patient. Accurate assessment means a correct diagnosis.

Nursing Diagnosis

A nurse takes note of actual or potential problems her patient may have during a health assessment. From the list of subjective and objective data, she formulates nursing analysis/ diagnosis, which she uses to create a care plan and give proper intervention (independent, dependent or collaborative).

Problem management

The nurse continuously does a health assessment on her patient to see if her interventions are effective. If not, she makes adjustments to her NCP to address the patient's malfunctions or infirmities.

Evaluation

Evaluation of a patient's condition is done through health assessments. Evaluations determine if a patient has responded to nursing care sufficiently enough to be recommended for discharge.

Criteria for discharge

During a health assessment, a nurse may become aware that a patient is lacking information that may help improve his condition. This provides the nurse with an opportunity to impart this information before he/she is discharged.

Collaboration and Advocacy

When a nurse performs a health assessment, she may find a problem that requires the expertise of other members of the health care team. In this case, the nurse notifies the proper health care team member of the problem and makes sure the patient receives the expert care that they need. Here, she becomes an advocate for her patient.