Nursing Assessment Essay

Evaluate Nursing Assessment demonstrating an understanding of physical, psychsocial, cultural and ethical considerations.

Nursing has a proud history to the public, and the public expects competent nurses to provide safe and ethical nursing care.
The School Nurse plays an important role in nursing assessments. The process of assessment involves a variation of assessment tools, including interview and observational testing.
Assessment is a key component of nursing practice, required for planning and provision of patient and family centered care. Nurses use a systematic and dynamic way to collect and analyse data about a patient to enable them to deliver patient-focused care. Assessment not only includes physical data but also psychosocial,

Documentation is one of the vital components of ethical, safe and effective nursing practices that provide comprehensible image of the clients health status and their outcomes.

As nurses we must draw on critical thinking and problem solving skills to make clinical decisions and plan care for the patient being assessed. If any abnormal findings are identified, the nurse must ensure that appropriate action is taken. This may include communicating the findings to the multi-disciplinary team.
Davison and Neale, (2001, p.62) state that “The purpose of the assessment process is to diagnose, and to find the best treatment for a disorder and to do this the problem it must be classified correctly”.
General assessment of the patients overall physical, emotional and behavioural state include parent-child and child-parent interaction, gross and fine motor skills, developmental milestones, communication and mood and affect. Clinicians recognise the importance of establishing rapport with their clients (Davison and Neale, 2001,

Clinical judgement should be used to decide on the extent of assessment required.
Psychosocial health is the importance of being mentally, emotionally, socially and spiritually sound. But individuals who are deemed to be psychosocially healthy aren’t completely devoid of problems. Its the way people view themselves and how they deal with stressful situations that sets psychosocially people apart from those who are not.
The thinking portion of psychosocial health is known as Mental Health. In Nursing Assessment, the demonstration of understanding plays an important role. It is the process of collecting and interpreting information and evaluating interventions and the effectiveness of any future treatment programmes that can be offered by ourselves or signposted appropriately.
Fletcher et al (1995) state that “actions can then be explained by demonstrating the ethical principles, which justify them”.
As we are living in this culturally diverse society it is of extreme importance that healthcare providers deliver appropriate services that are fair, culturally sensitive and are respective of the individual’s culture. This can only truly occur when health care providers understand individual cultures and the needs, values and beliefs of the individuals within