Professional Role Socialization Paper
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M6A3: Professional Role Socialization Paper
The Associate Degree in NURSING program at Excelsior College is designed for individuals with significant clinical health care experience. This means that all students have provided some aspect of health care for patients. Transitioning to the role of the Professional Nurse requires development of a new framework in your approach to patient care. The process of role transition requires you to reflect on what knowledge and skills you bring as a student and how you transform into the role of the professional nurse. While not all students in the program are licensed PRACTICAL NURSES similarities exist in the evolution of your current position to a new role.
Using APA format, write a six (6) to ten (10) page paper (excludes cover and reference page). A minimum of three (3) current professional references must be provided. Current references include professional publications or valid and current websites dated within five (5) years. Additionally, a textbook that is no more than one (1) edition older than current textbook may be used.
Read the following and then compose your paper:
Chapter 4: Role Transition (Reprinted with permission from: Lora Claywell (2009) LPN to RN Transitions 2nd ed.) St. Louis, MO: Elsevier.)
Ellis & Hartley (10th ed), Nursing in Today’s World. Chapter 1, pp. 26-28, Characteristics of a Profession.
The paper consists of five (5) parts and must be submitted by the close of week six.
Part I: Define professional socialization. Using the criteria for a profession described in the assigned readings, discuss three (3) criteria of the NURSING profession which support professional socialization.
Part II: Refer to the Four Stages of Role Transition listed at the end of the Module Notes for this module. Read and summarize each stage. Then, identify the one stage which you are currently experiencing and support your decision.
Part III: Identify two barriers which may interfere with accomplishing Claywell’s FOURTH stage of role transition. For each barrier, describe two (2) resources to overcome each one. (total of 4 resources).
Part IV: Claywell (2009) discusses 8 areas of differences between the LPN and RN roles: Assessment skills, Patient teaching skills; Communication skills; Educational preparation; Intravenous Therapy; Legal responsibilities; NURSING care planning; Thinking skills. Choose three (3) differences and provide supporting evidence how the differences you selected are implemented AND why they are such an integral part of the RN role.
Part V: Conclusion. Describe your plan for socialization into the role of the professional nurse.
Compose your work using a word processor (or other software as appropriate) and SAVE it frequently to your COMPUTER. Use a 12 font size, double space your work and use APA format for citations, references, and overall format
SAMPLE ANSWER
Professional Role Socialization Paper
Professional socialization is process which a LPN must undergo so that she/he becomes a registered nurse. There are two processes. Formal socialization which entails process of planned educative experiences. These include physical assessment, diagnoses, developing patient care plan and patient education. On the other hand, informal socialization entails experiences from the process of learning such as evaluation of laboratory reports before medication administering. For a person to progress to RN, these two types of socialization are necessary. As RN, one is required to do routine exercises. This requires the ability to separate thinking processes from of practicing nurses. The person needs to visualize themselves as a nurse who has the capacity to provide quality care and patient centered care of patients and not just basic care. Therefore, socialization into registered nursing will entail formal and informal lessons, and a change in the process of thinking (Ares, 2014).
Transition from LPN to RN involves role socialization. Role is defined as set of expectations which are defined by the society as ethical or unethical in patient care. Each set of behaviors facilitate the formulation of performance checklist which is used to meet the expectations of the society. The roles of RN are having many elements which bring forth brilliant quality care to patients. Without each of the criteria and the elements, the role of nurses would not be very appealing. One of the most recognized criteria is that RN is a care provider. This entails functions such as screening of the patient, health promotion and establishing effective interventions which will facilitate restoration of the health. This is important because the RN is more frequently exposed to joys or sorrows which are experienced by the family members during the illness. In this case, the RN acts as a counselor. They usually have a scientific educational background which would assist them to adequately identify and promote patients demands (Goodfellow, 2014).
In the increased dynamic healthcare sector, patients are becoming more involved in the healthcare today more than before. This implies that they have to be informed adequately about the health care aspects and those affecting the general republic. The RN has a functional role as an educator. The RN is expected to provide quality care on nutritional, treatments and other information pertinent to healthcare information. This includes community teaching, CPR courses, answering questions on maternal mothers. Again, the nurse acts as a manager. The role of RN includes supervision of the healthcare, planning, and coordination of patients, families and other members of the community. To be effective for this function, one should possess capacity for decision making purposes and ability to solve problems. These are all vital aspects for professional socialization (Claywell, 2009).
Transitional stages
RN professional socialization pathway takes a person through four transition stages before one becomes fully acknowledged as a full Registered nurse. During the program, the student is expected to face some obstacles and challenges; depending on the student’s character about nursing, one may move from one stage to another faster than the peers. The first LPN/LVN to RN stage begins when a nurse enters a completion program for RN i.e. the instant when the nurse considered making an application. This point is characterized by various emotions including joy and fulfillment for facing a new challenge and career progress and worries of failure and not meeting the demands required by the program. At this stage, the student seems to be a bit anxious. At the beginning, the student seems to be skeptical as to actually there is much to be taught about, especially because most have practiced nursing for a long period of time. Some have an attitude because they are overconfident of their abilities and experiences as nurses; thereby challenging the fact that there is much more to learn in nursing (Ares, 2014).
Later in the program, the student enters stage two. This stage is characterized by mixed feelings especially those related to the dissonance of the students’ abilities. As more education material is presented to them, they start viewing nursing education in a new way, a way which they were unfamiliar earlier on. The grading systems changes completely as compared to practical nursing programs. The grading system and requirements are strict and very demanding, this may discourage the student and may feel incapable to successfully complete the program; which may make a student frustrated and very anxious. For instance, when nurse student is on clinical rotations, it is possible to find most of students tend to offer LPN/LVN patient care, and feel inadequate when challenged with ethical dilemma issues (Claywell, 2009).
As a result, the patient possesses self-doubt and high insecurity at this stage of professional socialization. The third stage entails the attitude of letting go the previous ways of thinking; and the acceptance of new way of thinking and behaviors. The nurse students develop new insights into learning needs of a person, and may display willingness to adopt new knowledge in nursing and skills. In this stage, the student seems happy and satisfied in the manner in which they managed to meet the challenge. They also enjoy the new information gained. The students in this stage are less frustrated or getting anxious about their failures, but rather seem to focus on their goal. The student in this stage is more relaxed. Stage Four is the final stage; this stage is described by completely adopting attitudes and incorporates behaviors of a registered nurse in their daily activities. Most students feel more knowledgeable, and often find more pleasure in achieving higher education level. The students at this stage are more prepared to find comprehensive care (Goodfellow, 2014).
Currently, I am in stage three of transition. Though challenging, I have learnt to let go the practical nurse thinking process. For instance, I have learnt that comprehensive care requires critical thinking processes. This is especially when it comes to care planning. As a practical nurse, I was required to only identify common health issues and to participate in helping the patient have better healthcare outcome. However, through the learning process, I have learnt to use the healthcare problems and complications to solve problems by formulating healthcare plan; through establishing mutual benefit with the family, patient and other healthcare teams. Also, as a registered nurse, I have learnt to supervise the implementation of the care plan and to reflect on the outcomes. In this stage, I have learnt that as a RN, I am more oriented to designing, implementation and evaluation of the plan of care, for quality outcome (Ares, 2014).
Fourth transitional stage barrier
Some of the barriers faced by RN during the transition stages include segregation by the peers. This is because the programs teaches one to perceive problems and issues which peers may not perceive. The peers could fell overwhelmed by the immense knowledge the nurse have, and the well-articulated decision making processes. The best resource to address this problem is RN to teach skills taught during the program. This will enhance quality of care in the healthcare facility and also make other LPN/LVN get interested in following the pursuit, consequently, an enhanced care process. The health care facility can also organize nurse empowerment programs, whereby the best LPN nurses are partially sponsored to enroll to the RN program (Goodfellow, 2014).
Secondly, the RN may feel frustrated and overwhelmed due to the over expectations. This is especially when they are assigned the RN roles at place of work such as leadership. Managing interpersonal relationship with other LPN/LVN peers is an issue. Balancing between work attributes and as well lead as a servant could be one barrier. In this case, the program must prepare the student adequately to manage their psychosocial stability. This will ensure that the student does not suffer from emotional outburst. The work environment should be observed to ensure that the nurses advancing their studies are not bullied, sidelined or laid off for unnecessary reasons such as prolonged leave to attend to their program schedules such as practicum (Price, 2009).
Differences in LPN/LVN roles as compared to RN roles
Care planning is among one of the differences between the roles. The process is very important during patient care. Whereas the The practicing nurse role in care planning entails identifying of common patient problems, and helping patients meet their demand; the registered nurses use these challenges to formulate care plans and to empower the patient so as a mutual goal is attained. The RN programs teach on nursing diagnosis process in broader context than in practicing program. The RN tends to be more oriented in designing and implementation process as well as the outcome evaluation and care plan reflection process (Dinmohammadi, Peyrovi, & Mehrdad, 2013).
Legal responsibilities are also roles which LP/LVN and RN differ significantly. In some cases, the practicing nurse could be put in charged in areas where RNs roles are required, including long term healthcare facility. The practicing nurse is able to meet this challenge because they do have little preparation and background in management theory. Roles such as team leader, managerial tasks, nurse administrator and charge nurse are often accorded to registered nurses because their experiences and education background have prepared them sufficiently for such tasks. In other word, the situations which demand higher level of thinking processes and judgment are given to RN (Kramer, Et al., 2011).
Communication skills are necessary for all nurses, irrespective of their level i.e. registered or practicing nurses. Therapeutic communication is normally introduced at LPN/LVN level with the aim of preparing the students to effectively interact the healthcare team and the patients. However, due to the limited time, the topic is not taught extensively. On the other hand, the registered nurses are taught on how to handle abnormal and normal communication processes, especially when making patient physical assessment. The RN are also given chance to interact with patients with behavioral issues and complications. To ensure that the nurses complete courses in communication, the RN is also required to complete psychology courses as well as sociology courses. This ensures that they have a better understanding of behavioral cues which might communicate important clues to communication (Farrell, Payne, & Heye, 2015).
These three aspects indicate how RN and LPN/LN are differently prepared to deal with the patient. This does not imply that some nurses are equal than others. No, practicing nurse is equal to RN, irrespective of the licensure. However, it is important for a practicing nurse who is undergoing transition to registered nurse differentiate roles between the two nursing concepts, and be in a position to adopt the new ways of thinking on nursing care. This will involve the nurse developing eagerness attitude and be willing to assume new roles and responsibilities; this also ensures that the nurse sees the real benefits for advancing their education level (Ares, 2014).
Conclusion
Given these implications, the student should honor the feelings of legitimacy developed during the transition process. The student should ensure that they use any opportunities available to interact with the instructors and RN at work place in order to understand the experiences. The student should strive to evaluate their progress; they should feel different about themselves. The student should also strive to achieve the learning goals and integrate the new experiences in their day to day activities. Although challenging, the student should be trained to be make critical decision making and process. This makes them reason before acting on something, making the person evaluate the best intervention as evidenced by research. As a nurse student, it is their responsibility to continue researching and to continue to gain as much knowledge as possible through the guidance of RN seniors and the RN professors in the university.
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