Metaparadigm Nursing Theory

According to McEwen and Wills (2014), decades before Dorothea Orem developed the Self-Care Deficit Nursing Theory (SCDNT) in 1971, the identity of nursing as an independent field of study was not clearly defined. Several theories from Medicine and the Social sciences were the basis of earlier Nursing theories written between the 1950s and the 1970s. For example, Abraham Maslow’s work in Psychology, Hierarchy of Needs Theory, influenced earlier Nursing theories based on human needs. Orem, however, did not specify any theorist who provided the basis for the SCDNT. Instead, she cited Parson’s structure of social action and von Bertalanffy’s general systems theory – a sociologist and biologist respectively. In addition, Orem defined the metaparadigm

concepts as: Nurse, Humans, Environment and Health. Her theory’s underlying premise is the belief that humans need to communicate and interact among themselves and their environments to remain alive and to function. Several institutions in the United States and abroad, both in Nursing education and clinical settings, have adapted the Self-Care Deficit Nursing Theory (McEwen & Wills, 2014). Orem’s decades of work are notably applicable and evident in the current health care system in the United States as physicians and nurses are pushing for rehabilitation during hospital stay, as well as patient’s transition to their homes or to an appropriate facility.