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Reflection in clinical practice
The importance of reflection within nursing
Reflective practice in nursing + sample
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Recommended: Reflection in clinical practice
According to the Royal College of Nursing, reflection is an important process which helps professionals plan and deliver high quality and safe care to patients. Using reflective practice can be essential to making sense of events and actions, enabling improvement to be achieved and changes to be made as needs can be identified. Reflection can support both personal and professional development, highlighting areas of improvement which can allow individuals to change and adapt to a situation if it were to occur again. Reflection can also contribute towards and support positive evidence based practice, using my knowledge from past experiences to better my judgement and decisions in future circumstances.
The use of reflection within the profession of nursing is crucial, according to the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) all nurses and midwives must have a reflective discussion with another registered nurse or midwife as part of their revalidation. The discussion is based upon five written reflective accounts, the NMC suggests this is to prevent working in professional isolation and to encourage a culture of sharing, reflection and improvement between professionals within the trust.
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The NMC Code of Conduct (2017) states you must have knowledge of and keep to the relevant laws and policies about protecting and caring for vulnerable people, therefore as a nurse it is important to keep up to date with training on safeguarding to be aware of any changes. I am aware that safeguarding relates with other themes I have studied, for example diversity. The NMC Code states to recognise diversity and individual choice, this is because of the diverse society we live in today and therefore health care professionals must protect the rights of their patients which includes promoting equality and
The intention of this written essay is to demonstrate an understanding of my views on reflection and the issues surrounding reflective practice. It is based on nursing skills that I used during my practice placement, most importantly reflecting on the professional value of privacy and dignity.
Nurses are able to reflect upon their past experiences of work and build and improve this ensuring their level of competence and skills is in line with NMC guidelines. Improving the quality of care provided to patients is an ongoing process and requires practitioners to contently reflect and improve their practice. (Howatson-Jones, 2013) One way in which reflection can improve the quality of care is through the use of professional supervision, as stated by (Daly, Speedy and Jackson, 2014) a focus for supervision should be enhancing a nurse’s skills and ability to reflect on practice. It should reflect on the standard of care provided and highlight areas for improvement such as further training. This, in turn, leads to a greater self-awareness of practitioners’ own abilities. The process is not about finding faults, but to improve and learn to ensure the quality of care is high and professional for all patients. Being self-aware is a skill important to reflection and the provision of quality of
NMC, 2010. The code: Standards of conduct, performance and ethics for nurses and midwives. [online] Available at: [Accessed 13 November 2013]
The purpose of this Reflective assignment is to demonstrate how the application of the Registered Nurses standards for practise (2016) can be used in reflective practise. The Registered Nurses standards of Practise (2016) states that RN’s should develop their practise through reflecting on experiences, knowledge, actions, their feelings and beliefs and recognise how these factors shape professional practise(RNSP, 1.2).Reflection allows individuals to look back on their day-to-day situations and how they made us react and feel; what we would change if we had the chance, to create a different outcome; and what we would do next time to enhance the way we conduct ourselves in a professional manner.
When I was working as a bedside nurse in the Emergency Department, in one of my duties I was not satisfied with the treatment plan made by a resident doctor for XYZ patient. He entered intravenous KCL (potassium chloride) for the patient. The purpose of that medication and its dose for that patient was not clear to me. I assessed patient history and came to know that a middle aged patient came with the complaint of loose bowel movements, vomiting, and generalized weakness. His GCS (Glasgow comma scale) was 15/15, looked pale but was vitally stable. I exactly do not remember about his previous disease, social or family history but I do remember that he was there with his son. According to the care plan, I inserted intravenous cannula, took blood
Burns, S. Bulman, C. Palmer, A. (1997) Reflective Practice in Nursing - The growth of the professional practitioner. London: Blackwell Science.
Reflection has its importance in clinical practice; we always seek to be successful and that can be achieved by learning every day of our life through experiences we encounter. In that way we can reconsider and rethink our previous knowledge and add new learning to our knowledge base so as to inform our practice. Learning new skills does not stop upon qualifying; this should become second nature to thinking professionals as they continue their professional development throughout their careers (Jasper, 2006). According to Rolfe et al. (2001), reflection does not merely add to our knowledge, it also challenges the concepts and theories by which we try to make sense of that knowledge. Acquiring knowledge through reflection is modern way of learning from practice that can be traced back at least to the 1930s and the work of John Dewey, an American philosopher and educator who was the instigator of what might be called ''discovery learning'' or learning from experience. He claimed that we learn by doing and that appreciating what results from what we do leads to a process of developing knowledge, the nature and importance of which then we must seek to interpret (Rolfe et al., 2001).
Reflection and analysis of critical incidents is widely regarded as a valuable learning tool for nurses. Practice requires us to explore our actions and feelings and examine evidence-based literature, thus bridging the gap between theory and practice (Bailey 1995). It also affords us the opportunity to change our way of thinking or practicing, for when we reflect on an incident we can learn valuable lessons from what did and did not work. In this way, we develop self-awareness and skills in critical thinking and problem solving (Rich & Parker 2001). Critical incidents? ?
Middleton, J. (2004). A Practical To Promote Reflective Practice Within Nursing .Retrieved March 31, 2004 from www.nursingtimes.net.
Nursing and midwifery council (2008) The Code: standard of conduct, performance and ethics for nurses and midwives. London: Nursing and Midwifery council
Definitions of reflection vary depending on the discipline of the author. Having reviewed the literature, Bulman (2008, p.2), a nurse, defines it as “reviewing an experience from practice so that it may be described, analysed, evaluated and used to inform and change future practice”. It is a personal process requiring honesty, openness, self-awareness, courage and a willingness to act on criticism. It acknowledges that feelings and emotions influence actions. Critical reflection involves in depth examination and questioning of personal, social, historical, cultural and political assumptions and perspectives that are embedded in actions. It is an active process enabling one to make sense of events, situations and actions that occur in the workplace (Oelofsen, 2012). It transforms a situation in which there is confusion and doubt to one that is clear and coherent (Dewey, 2010).
It may have been something you did differently that had a positive result and you may conclude you would do it again upon reflection. The most important part of reflection is making sense of situations and events that occur so that our decision making and any actions we take lead to good, effective practice. Nurses have to keep a record of their continued professional development. At annual reviews, nurses are able to present evidence of their development through a portfolio which should contain reflective accounts of their practice. These reflective accounts will help them identify strengths and weaknesses, highlight their performance, improve their skills and highlight any areas that could be developed.
Developing confidence, and competence is a challenge faced by novice nurses (Morrell & Ridgway, 2014). Over the course of my nursing degree developing, and maintaining confidence in my clinical practice has always been a personal challenge. During my preceptorship placement, I have the opportunity to continue to cultivate my confidence, and prepare to begin my practice as an independent graduate nurse. In the reflection, I will discuss how I have gradually become a confident practitioner through my experiences in my clinical placement, and especially those in my preceptorship placement.
The case study focused on a nursing student named Jane, who described how she “absorbed her patient’s emotional trauma like a sponge” (Rees, 2012, pg. 321). Through reflective practice, Jane claimed she was able to “deal with the emotional challenges such as fear she frequently felt in practice” (Rees, 2012, pg. 321). Dr Rees findings established how reflection can help nurses manage their emotions, in order to help the individual gain strength to overcome emotions brought about by the practice of nursing. Clearly reflective practice assists a nurse in being a success throughout their
Especially since nurses in the course of their day-to-day work need to be able to act autonomously and make appropriate clinical judgements (9). Reflection can be of value in making sense of difficult situations, as it allows one to clarify the situation for themselves and the outcome is to have a changed perspective which enables the nurses to improve his or her clinical judgement (2). Thus why, it is imperative nurses engage in lifelong reflection which recognises its value for professional growth and development and improvement in the quality of patient care (7). The Gibb’s model of reflection, for example is a great tool that nurses can use daily to help improve these skills.