The title of this post is in the format of a Nursing Diagnosis. A nursing diagnosis is sort of like a medical diagnosis in that it identifies a particular aspect of a patient to treat, however, it is has more to do with the individual, family, or community experience/response to the medical diagnosis or life processes than the medical diagnosis itself. It is basically distinguishing things that nurses can do to affect a patient's treatment experience. I am going to take you through my nursing diagnosis step-by-step, partially because it is an educational experience for me and partially because it is a de-stressing activity.
Nursing school has so many side effects on nursing students. There are obvious ones like increased critical thinking and communication skills, decreased gag-reflex, and impaired writing skills. One major one for me is increased anxiety levels. Up until now, I have dealt with the anxiety-inducing events with ease, following the thought process that the event is going to happen anyway so I might as well prepare as best as I can for it while I can instead of stressing about it. Now, with a completed medication administration performance evaluation under my belt (as of this afternoon) and a major exam coming up tomorrow, my mindset is a bit less accepting. This afternoon, immediately before my performance evaluation, I felt the first symptoms of my anxiety. They diminished slightly after running at the gym, but resumed at a greater intensity after I returned to campus and studied with peers. My anxiety, as it is due to more than one factor of nursing school, is secondary to nursing school.
Although my heightened anxiety is of reasonable concern, it is not my major concern at the moment - my lack of sleep is. A "disturbed sleep pattern" is a nurse's way of saying I am not getting enough sleep for some reason. Despite having the right environment to sleep (a quiet, warm, dark room), an adequate amount of time to sleep, and providing myself with an almost excessive level of comfort (body pillow, three blankets, and a stuffed cat to cuddle - DO NOT JUDGE ME) I am consistently unable to fall asleep. Whenever I try to sleep, my brain will not "power down" and I continue thinking about the same things that are causing me stress, further amplifying my anxiety.
As I write, I realize that the explanation of my anxiety is not complete; I have not spoken to what anxiety is and how I experience anxiety (such as the physical response). I will not go into detail in this post about it as I do want to try to get some rest in preparation for my exam tomorrow, but I will emphasize that everyone experiences and expresses anxiety differently and that some forms of anxiety relief are not as effective for some as others.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed my brief explanation of nursing diagnoses! If you have any questions, please feel free to leave them in the comments below.
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