KNOWLEDGE AND USE OF NURSING PROCESS AS A TOOL FOR QUALITY CARE IN THE MANAGEMENT OF PATIENTS
CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1. BACKGROUND OF STUDY

In these early days, nursing was characterized by two aims: Care of the sick and promotion of health. These were accomplished with little or no direction from medicine.

In caring for the sick, nurses concentrated on providing and modifying the environment so that health could be restored. In promoting health nurses were primarily concerned with teaching women on how to create an environment that is conducive to healthy living for their families, thereby reducing the risk for illness.

As the practice of modern medicine began to take shape, the medicine disease oriented model of health care emerged and this model with its emphasis on illness/disease provided the frame work of nursing care as well. Physicians gain control of hospital

and thereby gained control of nursing practice in hospital settings. Independently, nursing activities such as modifying the environment and giving emotional support remained a past of carrying out medical orders prescribed by physicians to cure disease. The practice focused on the action of nurses and these action were based on neither necessarily structure deliberate, based on scientific evidence nor was individualized to the consumers of nursing care. This result in lack of full satisfaction of consumers’ need. Nwonu, E.I. (2007).

Today, clients know more about their body, their mental and physical health than they did. In earlier eras, they are also beginning to assume active and decision-making role in seeking and accepting health care services. They are making it known that they would and have a right to be treated as whole human beings and not a disease entity.

On the side of health care delivery knowledge explosion brought about a lot of specialization and development of numerous healths’ discipline.

In one sense, the multi disciplinary approach to health care is desirable because ideally, it ensures that the carious needs of the client will be met on the other hand as more and more separate discipline becomes involved with each treatment, health care becomes fragmented service were duplicated and client felt divided into bits and pieces and this brought about a lot of dis-satisfaction of the client.

In the face of all these, nursing had to change to be able to satisfy the consumers of nursing. It had to struggle to assume its place as an independent profession that is accountable to the consumers of health care. It had to aim at helping people to care and decision making about health. Nursing thus became concerned with their clients total needs and made concerned effort to develop a more system and rational pattern for the practice of nursing.

Nursing process is the fruit of all these efforts and it has been adopted as the frame and reference of nursing practice. Kozier, B.etal.(2008)

1.2 STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

The researcher having worked in Ahmadu Bello University Hospital Shika, Zaria has noticed that nurses do not use nursing process format effectively for caring of patients.

Having had the knowledge that nursing process is a tool for quality individualized care and in this dynamic society today. Nursing process is needed to achieve satisfaction in service. The researcher is prompted to find out whether the nurses in ABUTH, now the factors responsible for poor implementation of Nursing process.

1.3. RESEARCH QUESTIONS

i. What does nursing process mean to nurses?

ii. Do nurses know the benefit of nursing process in rendering care/services?

iii. What are the factors militating against the implementation of nursing process?

iv. In what ways can the implementation of nursing process be improved?

1.4. OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

i. To find out the idea of nurses about nursing process

ii. To ascertain use of nursing process in the care of patents by nurses.

iii To find out the factor militating against implementation of nursing process.

iv. To find out how implementation of nursing process can be improved.

1.5. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The study will help to throw more light in the knowledge and use of nursing process as a tool for quality care in the management of patients in Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital Shika, Zaria.

And it will help improve quality of individualized care given to patients.

1.6. SCOPE/LIMITATION OF THE STUDY

Scope: The scope of the study care nurses in Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Shika. Zaria.

Limitations: The study is limited to Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Shika, Zaria.

1.7. OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF TERMS

• Implementation: is the performance of an obligation

• Nursing process: is an orderly and systematic manner of determining the client problems, making plans to solve them, initiating plan or assigning others to implement and evaluating the extent to which the plan was effective in resolving the problem identified.

• Multilingual: Means use o various/several languages.