What Are The Barriers To Effective Clinical Supervision

CLINICAL SUPERVISION
Clinical supervision is rapidly gaining momentum throughout nursing. Rapid changes in healthcare delivery, a shift from illness to prevention and wellness, the informed healthcare consumer and aging population mandate knowledge, expertise, critical thinking, excellent interpersonal skills, all of which have promoted an impetus for the introduction of clinical supervision in practice (Driscoll, 2006) and ongoing pressure to continually improve standards of care are all drivers for the implementation of effective clinical supervision in practice, now perhaps more than ever before (Walsh, 2002).

DEFINTION
There are no universal definitions for clinical supervision and it varies in literature and as said by (Lyth, 2000) the concept remains ill defined. The most comprehensive definition is that by Winstanley and White (2003) who defined clinical supervision as “focusing upon the provision of empathetic support to improve therapeutic skills, the transmission of knowledge and the facilitation of reflective practice. The participants have an opportunity to evaluate, reflect and develop their own clinical practice and provide a support
One obvious concern about clinical supervision given the plethora of published research and commentary regarding it is that too much is being asked of this one process, especially in busy acute inpatient settings. Many commentators and researchers note common tensions if not contradictions between clinical and managerial understandings, expectations, and rationales for clinical supervision. If supervisees perceive it to be a surveillance tool or the provision of indirect counselling, they are unlikely to participate meaningfully (Walsh et al., 2003). Clinical supervision usually a one-to-one person process and it may cause participant reticence, anxiety, defensiveness, resistance, and other ordinary human reactions (Stevenson,