Abstract
Philosophy is the process of understanding the fundamental ideas around human nature and their environment. The discipline is applied in different areas of nursing, including education, research, and administration. The nursing personal philosophy discussed in this paper is parallel to Florence Nightingale’s philosophy, which was deeply enshrined in promoting individual-based nursing services.
Philosophy
Philosophy is the process of understanding the fundamental ideas around human nature and their environment. Philosophy is a discipline that has been used to develop personal beliefs in different aspects of human life. These beliefs shape the decision-making processes of the respective individuals. Philosophy enables people to understand their relationships with their environment and the people around them (What is Philosophy? 2015). Philosophy broadens knowledge by compelling learners to assume critical lines of thought.
Personal philosophy of nursing
Nursing is a process of learning, which continues to refine the beliefs held by nurses. People should be helped during their weakest points of life, and this influences many people to choose nursing as their career. Family members and friends also influence their relatives to pursue the nursing career through mentorship. Spiritual backgrounds of aspiring nurses should be pillars to support their personality, and they should be well acquainted with their strengths and weaknesses.
Every patient’s case of nursing care is a learning opportunity to enhance the knowledge possessed by nurses. They should aspire to continue learning throughout their career, and they should develope the culture of reading material regarding nursing to broaden their understanding of different guidelines. Nurses should focus on providing personalized nursing care to patients because every patient has different needs that must be met to enhance his or her state of wellness. Nurses should be strong advocates of individual-based nursing care in the health care system. They should aspire always to learn from patients as they interact with them on a personal level during the provisions of nursing care. It is only through the development of interpersonal relationships with patients that a nurse can accurately find out the specific needs of a patient. Nursing care should go beyond the provisions of physical care; it should also entail the enhancement of psychological wellness of the patients.
Nurses should be charged with the enhancement of the quality of health in the community. Nurses have the responsibility, and the opportunity to communicate directly with patients; hence, they can effectively promote health in the community. The physicians should be ready to take up the responsibility of creating health awareness in the society by providing free advice to patients and other members of the community.
Promoting health in the society is a function of taking care of the environment because the environment is a major factor in predisposing people to different diseases. Nurses have the obligation to ensure there is sustainable development of the environment. For instance, if a nurse handles a case of a patient suffering from a waterborne disease, the respective nurse should look into educating the rest of the community about waterborne diseases. In addition to this, the nurse should look into ways of promoting the provision of clean water to the affected community. Nursing should have a holistic approach, which not only solves health issues, but also promotes environmental sustainability.
Application of personal philosophy
In education, philosophy is applied in various disciplines to develop a better understanding of the relationships between people and their immediate environment. Philosophy enables students to understand the purpose of education in their lives. Recurrent education is a necessity for nursing practitioners because it improves their ability to deal with the changing service requirements of patients. In the same capacity, educating the patients and the community about health is also a major requirement. Nurses’ philosophy should embrace education, and they should always advocate that people should enhance their knowledge about health. They should focus on learning from their respective teams in the profession, and imparting knowledge as a mentors to aspiring nurses of the future. Nurses should adopt personal philosophies matching the philosophy of Florence Nightingale, who strived to influence continuous changes in nursing guidelines to meet the ever changing needs of patients.
Philosophy in administration helps the professionals involved to develop environments that promote high motivation for the employees. Philosophy enables administrators to develop appropriate work guidelines that foster teamwork. Just like Florence Nightingale’s philosophy, nurses’philosophy should be inclined toward compelling nursing administrators to implement nursing guidelines more effectively (Gill, 2004). A nurse should focus on developing leadership skills that will land him or her in an administrative position, which would enable the nurse to make a greater impact to the profession. Florence Nightingale developed nursing guidelines that are still an integral part of the nursing profession, and nurses should aspire to have a similar impact on the profession.
Philosophy is extensively applied in research as a discipline that seeks to understand various fundamental ideas is different areas of science. The key to developing effective nursing guidelines is conducting extensive research on the viability of different approaches. A personal philosophy calls for nursing professionals to be actively involved in studies to develop the best approaches to individual based nursing services. The changing needs of patients must be met with an equal effort to develop feasible nursing service delivery approaches. Nurses should be pioneers of change in their profession in the quest to enhance safety and the quality of their services.
References
Gill, G. (2004). Nightingales: The extraordinary upbringing and curious life of Miss Florence Nightingale. New York: Ballantine Books.
What is Philosophy? (2015). Web.