Ulcerative Colitis: Enable In Managing The Disease (Essay Sample)

Managing Ulcerative Colitis as a Family Nurse Practitioner
Student’s Name
Institution Affiliation
Managing Ulcerative Colitis as a Family nurse practitioner
Nursing practices follow various guidelines that assist nurses in choosing and applying the best procedures, which suit different patients regarding the kind of care needed. When an evidence-based approach is used in nursing, findings from current studies and research are utilized to make and support care decisions as per the patient. Research indicates that patients recuperate promptly when nurses incorporate evidence-based practices when providing care. In nursing, evidence-based practice is the utilization of the most current best evidence in shaping decisions concerning patient care. It is a problem-solving approach to nursing, which integrates careful usage of the most current best practices from well-researched studies and clinical expertise from qualified and experienced nurses (Robert, 2015).
Evidence-based practice promotes change with evidence as it introduces reliable facts in the field of nursing. These facts provide relevant and useful information that ascertains the best nursing practices, therefore, changing from relying on past experiences, notions, and opinions that could be false and unreliable. Nurses can engage in methods that have been tested and confirmed through research and proved to work positively towards enhancing a patient’s care. The study produces evidence that forms facts and eliminates trial and error methods of nursing hence giving an approach that allows a nurse to perform tasks that are the best for the patient. The process changes risk factors by guaranteeing safety for the patients. When using evidence-based practice, clinical outcomes tend to improve, and their variations reduce (Betty, Gail & Mary, 2016). In the end, the patients’ healthcare costs reduce due to efficiency in treatment and recovery procedures.
Research plays an essential role in evidence-based practice as it generates useful information that indicates how helpful or harmful a practice can be when performed at a particular time. Evidence created through research provides facts that give nurses the confidence to execute tasks and produce positive results regarding patients’ recovery. The research helps to ascertain that the procedures followed by the nurses are helpful and will improve the patient’s conditions. It also helps in generating knowledge and useful information about medical care that guides nurses when providing care to patients (Robert, 2015).
The nursing issue covered in this paper involves managing care for a patient with ulcerative colitis. It is a chronic condition that relapses and assumes an unpredictable course. I chose the issue because of the persistent nature of the disease and the fact that affected patients need a lot of expert nursing care, monitoring, and intervention to receive a conducive environment that enhances their quality of life. It also a condition that requires evidence-based practice while handling the patients since nurses need to acquire new information related to the disease. Therefore, for family nurse practitioners to provide the best care for ulcerative colitis patients, they need to keep up with current research and execute the best practices to provide adequate care for their patients (Winfried, Gabriele, Petra & Antonina, 2014).
Family Nurse Practitioner as a MSN Program Specialty Track
Several specialty tracks are available for nurses who seek to advance their nursing profession. The specialty identified for the management of ulcerative colitis is the Family Nurse Practitioner because it trains nurses at a Master’s level to be in a position to provide primary care especially for patients suffering from chronic diseases. Advancing practice within the family nurse practitioner specialty can bring a significant impact on the management of ulcerative colitis. Advancing practice will affect the management of ulcerative colitis positively as it will help the nurses to gain a functional competence and knowledge base that will assist them in providing reliable and advanced primary care (Julie & Nancy, 2017). Strong primary care is crucial when a nurse is handling patients with ulcerative colitis due to the superior management skills and practices that are required to manage the disease effectively. With specialized knowledge and skills, a family nurse practitioner can make an accurate diagnosis and monitor a patient’s functions efficiently, therefore, enhancing the management of ulcerative colitis (Winfried, Gabriele, Petra & Antonina, 2014).
Choosing to advance practice will have an impact on patients suffering from ulcerative colitis in that the family nurse practitioners can undertake a teaching-coaching function (Julie & Nancy, 2017). The feature allows family nurse practitioners to provide information and education on best self-care practices to the patients and offer counseling sessions that give encouragement and emotional support. Ulcerative colitis is a severe disease that requires patients to have family nurse practitioners that can provide advanced primary care by communicating efficiently and helping them understand the numerous measures and practices that they have to perform in a bid to improve their quality of life. Advancing practice can help to equip the family nurse practitioners with the right counseling procedures that can help them overcome bowel pain, enhance cooperation, prepare them for the necessary lifestyle changes and help them cope with helplessness. These activities can have a positive impact on their life and reduce the risk of hospitalization, thus reduce their healthcare costs and adjusting to achieve near-normal lives (Magdalena et al., 2014).
Managing Ulcerative Colitis as a Family Nurse Practitioner
Managing ulcerative colitis can be a daunting task for the affected patients and the nurses that do not have extensive knowledge about the disease. The disease tends to affect the patients for a significant part of their life, and its intensity worsens with exposure to certain conditions. Typical symptoms that accompany the disease include bloody diarrhea, fatigue, weight loss and severe abdominal pain. Nursing care of the illness usually focuses on symptom management, self-care practices, and behavioral adjustments. Magdalena et al. (2014) state that extensive and adequate supervision is required at all times to enable the patients to improve their quality of life. Without proper management, the disease can cause significant pain to the patient, lead to disability, deteriorate the patient’s physical and emotional well-being and even lead to death. Nurses without adequate knowledge about the disease can often encounter difficulty when trying to manage the symptoms or when providing psychological support to their patients (Winfried, Gabriele, Petra & Antonina, 2014). Therefore, family nurse practitioners form an integral part of sustaining a comfortable life for the patients.
The solution to the effective management of ulcerative colitis is in applying holistic approaches that can help the family nurse practitioners assess patient’s symptoms and create an evidence-based personalized care suited for the specific patient. The process can involve the treatment of the observed manifestations with current best practices based on research, therefore, improving the patient’s condition. The family nurse practitioners would be able to assess useful information resources and apply the findings to their practice (Betty, Gail & Mary, 2016). The stakeholders involved in the management of the disease include physicians, researchers, nurses, the patients and close friends and relatives to the patients. The stakeholders are expected to contribute to the assertive management of the disease, therefore expecting improved quality of life for the patient, reduced healthcare costs, personal satisfaction emanating from achieving success, and provision of new useful information on how to combat the disease (Robert, 2015).
Evidence-Based Practice Question
Family nurse practitioners need to carry out research to explore topics of interests and gain useful information that can be used when providing care. Research helps to increase new knowledge and information within the nursing field and forms an excellent basis for evidence-based practice. The process of investigating the management of ulcerative colitis requires the formulation of evidence-based questions that can draw concepts together and provide information on a specific research topic (Winfried, Gabriele, Petra & Antonina, 2014).
When using a quantitative approach, the family nurse practitioner can use the PICOT format to formulate great quantitative questions. PICOT explores Patient, Intervention, Comparator, Outcome and Time element. An excellent quantitative question should indicate the patient’s characteristics by providing a brief description of the sample. It should show the intervention used on the patient or the risks exposed to the affected individual. It should have a comparator that illustrates an alternative practice that should affect the outcome. The outcome of the intervention should be highlighted and lastly indicate th...