Professional Identity Of A Registered Nurse

Attributes of the nursing profession

Question:

Discuss About The Professional Identity A Registered Nursing?

Nursing is a profession that stands as the pillar in the health care industry holding all the different components together like the proverbial glue, ever since the introduction of this profession by Florence Nightingale. It has to be understood that nurses are those healthcare professionals who act not only in caring for the patient but It is also the medium of communication between the patient and the medical practitioner ensuring optimal treatment and care for the patients (Johnson, Cowin, Wilson, & Young, 2012). Accounting to Andrew, patients have a much more respectful and interactive relationship with the nurses as they spend most of the time while being in the healthcare facilities in the care of the nursing professionals, hence the patients find nurses to be  much more approachable when it comes to sharing their grievances and feedback (Andrew, 2012). However sadly, despite nursing being one of the noblest professions available, it has still not achieved its due recognition in the society. The profession of nursing is in dire need of respect and recognition in the society which can only be provided to them by developing a respectful professional identity for them. This essay will explore the above mentioned thesis statement taking the example of the blog by Caitlin Brassington, where the author expresses her grievances at being belittled in the society for being ‘just a nurse’ in profession.

Nursing as a profession represents a lot of different attributes, starting from courage compassion, selflessness, patience, perseverance and most of all kindness. A profession that has as many moral attributes associated with it demands a level of emotional investment from the professional that no other profession can even attempt to demand. Nurses have to complete a diverse range of activities and responsibilities on a daily basis, designing a patient centered care, carrying out the care plan, monitoring the response of the patient to the care plan, educating the patient and engaging him into the care plan, and communicating with the patient regarding any grievances that the patient might have with the care plan, and lastly providing compassionate psychological support and counseling to the patients in order to help him attain faster recovery (Hoeve, Jansen, & Roodbol, 2014). In order to complete all these activities at the same time for different patients on a daily basis the nurses straw just need to put in long hours, they need to invest emotional attachment and extreme effort from their end for restoring the health of the society. However despite all of the contributions of the nurses to the society, it is a profession that is seriously be result even in this current age. Many of the health care research writers have hinted at the importance of the nursing professionals in the health care industry for it to sustain, there is still lack of respect for the nursing professionals, and there are two prime contributing factors behind, the lack of a respectful professional identity in the society for the nurses, and the lack of knowledge and awareness in the mass about the contribution of the nursing profession in the present day health care (Hallam, 2012).

Lack of recognition for nurses

Drawing references from the article written by Caitlin Brassington, a registered nurse, who had been extremely angered and disheartened at being called just a nurse by one of her acquaintances, and her reaction had been more than justified (Brassington, 2017). As a registered nurse practicing in the Australia, there are a multitude of responsibilities to complete. A few of the roles and responsibilities that a registered nurse include performing physical assessment and taking health history, providing promotional and educational help experience along with counseling, medication administration and management and other patient-centered interventions, interpretation of patient information and critical decision making, coordination and collaboration of care within multidisciplinary healthcare team, directing and supervising care, and lastly conducting overall research to incorporate evidence based best practice (Marañón & Pera, 2015). However, there is very little knowledge in the mass regarding the responsibilities that a registered nurse has or the daily health care related activities that a RN partakes in. this extreme lack of knowledge and normal respect is reflected in the response ‘you are Just a Nurse’ of the acquaintance to Caitlin.

However, it had to be understood within this context that this lack of knowledge is a direct result of the conspicuous lack of a respectful professional identity for the nurses in the society bringing us to the other contributing factor mentioned above. While the blame for this consequence like a professional identity in the nursing profession can be bestowed upon the faulty designation structure and stereotyping within the healthcare industry and lack of recognizing the nothing works as an integral part of healthcare industry as of now, there is a basic lack of self respect and professional identity within the nursing professionals as well (Hood, et al., 2014). There are a lot of nursing individuals who fail to recognize and respect the contribution of their own profession due to either extreme work pressure and stress or unsatisfactory pay,  their lack of respect was there on profession is reflected in the standing the society has given to the nursing profession. Therefore nursing has been and continues to suffer in extreme lack of understanding in the general public, and these stereotypes feeds on the lack of respectful professional identity for the nurses. Therefore there is need for the nursing professionals to understand the contribution they are making for the society, and the indispensable role they play in the Healthcare industry restoring the health and wellbeing the entire society (Willetts & Clarke, 2014).

Importance of self-respect and professional identity

The term professional identity can be defined as an individual on perception on the attributes believes values motives and professional experiences in the context of the job roles and responsibilities that the individual has to partake in. In the blog by Caitlin Brassington, she has described bits and pieces of daily responsibilities as a registered nurse and has provided a beautiful contrast between the belittlement she received operations acquaintance and the magnitude of contribution as a nurse to the society by her (Sims, 2011). She has explained in this article how she had helped mothers deliver babies into the world, how to restore the dignity of the patients, counseled grieving patients after losing a child, perform CPR bringing patients back alive from the very brink of death, educated patients and junior nurses, etc.  She had also mentioned how she has sacrificed holidays, memorable days of her children, in order to fulfill her responsibilities as a registered nurse. Like a true professional Caitlin has successfully showcased all the professional attributes, delete values and opinions she has about her profession and has contradicted the belittlement acquaintance provided her calling her just a nurse.  She has expressed grief at being called just a nurse, in spite of the fact that she contributed and sacrificed so much for her profession and in order to fulfill her job responsibilities. Hence it can be concluded that Caitlin but successfully demonstrate a respectful and morally adequate professional identity as a registered nurse in her blog.

In my own opinion the block written by Caitlin Brassington had been an eye opener for all the nursing professionals sacrificing a lot in order to contribute to the society and fulfill the job responsibilities of a nurse. Kids in very beautifully outlined the responsibilities of a registered nurse however she missed out on a lot of details that a registered nurse has to go through on a daily basis. However her I think has been expressive along with been crucially truthful reflecting her pride at being a part of the nursing workforce. And I would like to follow her footsteps to develop selfless professionalism and compassionate kindness for my patience, all the while being extremely proud of my profession. Caitlin provides a glorious example of how a nursing profession and should be, and hence writing received a significant response in the social media. There are challenges in following her ideologies, face the extreme work pressure, stress, and lack of recognition (Vaismoradi, Salsali, & Ahmadi, 2011). However with a little support and willful effort it is not impossible to achieve, and as social media provides a great platform for connecting with other nursing professionals and gaining along with providing support, the standard set by Caitlin can be achieved easily.

References

Andrew, N. (2012). Professional identity in nursing: are we there yet?. Nurse Education Today.

Brassington, C. (2017, september 11). 'Am I just a nurse?'. Retrieved from ABC News: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-11/just-a-nurse-queensland-woman-writes-open-letter/7919422

Hallam, J. (2012). Nursing the image: media, culture and professional identity. Routledge.

Hoeve, Y. T., Jansen, G., & Roodbol, P. (2014). The nursing profession: public image, self?concept and professional identity. . A discussion paper. Journal of advanced nursing, 295-309.

Hood, K., Cant, R., Baulch, J., Gilbee, A., Leech, M., Anderson, A., & Davies, K. (2014). Prior experience of interprofessional learning enhances undergraduate nursing and healthcare students' professional identity and attitudes to teamwork. Nurse Education in Practice,.

Johnson, M., Cowin, L. S., Wilson, I., & Young, H. (2012). Professional identity and nursing: contemporary theoretical developments and future research challenges. International nursing review.

Marañón, A. A., & Pera, M. P. (2015). Theory and practice in the construction of professional identity in nursing students: a qualitative study. . Nurse education today,.

Sims, D. (2011). Reconstructing professional identity for professional and interprofessional practice: A mixed methods study of joint training programmes in learning disability nursing and social work. Journal of interprofessional management care.

Vaismoradi, M., Salsali, M., & Ahmadi, F. (2011). Perspectives of Iranian male nursing students regarding the role of nursing education in developing a professional identity: a content analysis study. Japan Journal of Nursing Science, 174-183.

Willetts, G., & Clarke, D. (2014). Constructing nurses’ professional identity through social identity theory. International journal of nursing practice, 164-169.