Definition of Roles and Major Concepts

Roles of the Professional Nurse

The definitions of the roles of the professional nurse derive from the American Association of Colleges of Nursing’s The Essentials of Baccalaureate Education for Professional Nursing Practice.

Provider of Care
A culturally-competent provider of care for diverse patient populations across the life span including individuals, families, groups, and communities in and across all environments. Patient care incorporates values, ethics, responsibility, and accountability; is based in holism; incorporates bio-psycho-social and spiritual aspects of health; and is evidence-based. Primary sub-roles include patient advocate, patient educator, communicator, and critical thinker.

Designer, Manager, and Coordinator of Care
A leader who delegates tasks to, supervises, and evaluates other health care personnel. A member of the interdisciplinary health care team who collaborates with other members to accomplish goals and evaluate nursing care outcomes. Uses self through self-awareness and self-evaluation to manage patient care. Also manages information as a provider of care, patient advocate, and educator of both patients and other health care personnel. Uses research findings to plan high quality and cost-effective care.

Member of a Profession
A professional who works to maintain a positive image of nursing. Incorporates values, ethics, legal and professional standards, and caring into all aspects of nursing practice. Committed to life-long learning and plans own professional career. Participates at various levels in political and regulatory processes to shape the health care delivery system.

Major Concepts

Caring
The AACN definition is used:
“Caring encompasses the nurse’s empathy for and connection with the patient, as well as the ability to translate these affective characteristics into compassionate, sensitive, appropriate care” (AACN, 1998, pg. 8). Caring includes, but is not limited to, the values of altruism, autonomy, human dignity, integrity, and social justice, and is based on ethical behaviors.

Communication
The AACN definition is used:
“Communication is a complex, ongoing, interactive process and forms the basis for building interpersonal relationships. Communication includes listening, as well as oral, nonverbal, and written communication skills.” (AACN, 1998, pg. 10). Skill in communicating is essential for positive outcomes when interacting with patients and collaborating with members of the health care team.

Critical Thinking
The intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication as a guide to belief and action. Scriven & Paul as quoted in Keating (2006, pg. 62). According to AACN (1998), “critical thinking includes questioning, analysis, synthesis, interpretation, inference, inductive and deductive reasoning, intuition, application, and creativity” (pg. 9).

Evidence-Based Practice
The American Nurses Association’s Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice definition is used: A process founded on the collection, interpretation, and integration of valid, important, and applicable patient-reported, clinician-observed, and research-derived evidence. The best available evidence, moderated by patient circumstances and preferences, is applied to improve the quality of clinical judgments (ANA, 2004, pg. 48).

Human Diversity/Cultural Competence
The AACN definition of human diversity is used:
“Human diversity includes understanding the ways cultural, racial, socioeconomic, religious, and lifestyle variations are expressed (pg. 14). Human diversity is a broad concept that encompasses culture. Therefore, culture is a part of human diversity. Cultural competence (rather than human diversity competence) is a term commonly used to embrace an understanding of the effects of all aspects of human diversity on health status and response to health care.

Leader
According to Yoder-Wise (2007), “A leader is an individual who works with others to develop a clear vision of the preferred future and to make that vision happen” (pg. 28). An effective leader engages in lifelong learning, is service-oriented and concerned with the common good, radiates positive energy, lead balanced lives, are synergistic, and see things as greater than the sum of the parts. An effective leader is also able to engage in self-renewal.

Professionalism
Professionalism is the behavior of a member of a profession. A profession is characterized by autonomy, a defined body of knowledge, independent standards for practice, accountability, responsibility to society, a code of ethics, and self-governance (Polifko, 2007, pg. 378). A professional person uses and applies these characteristics of a profession in all activities. AACN notes that “…the term professional implies the acquisition and use of a well-defined and broad knowledge base for practice. Professional nursing requires strong critical thinking, communication and assessment skills, and the demonstration of a balance of intelligence, confidence, understanding, and compassion. Membership in the profession requires the development and acquisition of an appropriate set of values and an ethical framework. As advocates for high quality care for all individuals, nurses must be knowledgeable and active in the political and regulatory processes defining health care delivery and systems of care. Nurses must also be committed to life-long learning and willing to assume responsibility for planning their professional careers, which increasingly will include graduate study as the route to advancement” (AACN, 1998, pgs. 5-6). These characteristics of professionalisms permeate the RN to BSN curriculum.

 

Previous