Health Concepts in Nursing | Case Study

Running Head: HEALTH CONCEPTS IN NURSING
HEALTH CONCEPTS IN NURSING
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

HEALTH CONCEPTS IN NURSING1
Introduction:
Health is one of the concepts that help in maintaining a balance between an individual
and the environment that the person survives usually. Diarrhoea is one of the most common
health issues that arise amongst all the age groups and can range from mild, temporary to a fatal
condition. The symptoms comprise of abnormal bowel movements along with the passage of
watery stools. The paper below discusses the case study of Kiley Hastings and the patient is seen
to be initially suffering from loose motions, thereby the nursing interventions in respect to the
diagnosis (Akbulut & Akpinar, 2017) of the patient and prioritising them. The paper also refers
to the discussion about the case study related to a 5-month-old baby girl and the treatment that
needs to be incorporated to make her get better.
Discussion:
The Case of Kiley Hastings:
Kiley Hastings, a five-month-old baby, was left with her baby sitter as her parents went
on a break to camp at the forest. It was observed that the baby has been had been suffering from
diarrhoea (Kotloff, 2017) since the day her parents had left and that on being taken to the
emergency department she was diagnosed of symptoms of being lethargic, displaying sunken
eyes. Her peripheral pulses were found weak and the refill in the capillaries was found to be
much delayed. Moreover, her skin appeared mottled and felt cold on being touched. The
temperature, blood pressure, respiration rate were all located on the high side and the heart rate
was very high as well. The condition of Kiley was determined to be a case of acute diarrhoea by
the initial diagnosis performed by the nurses at the emergency department.

HEALTH CONCEPTS IN NURSING2
Nursing Diagnosis:
Rotavirus (Nirwati et al., 2016) is considered as one of the main reasons that cause
diarrhoea. Diarrhoea is considered as one of the diseases that causes an increase in the frequency
of bowel movements along with the amount of water and the volume of the waste that gets
excreted. The condition poses a severe threat to the patients if it persists for a more extended
period. The severe cases of diarrhea can lead to the condition of being water deprived, ultimately
leading to dehydration. Diagnosing the case for diarrhea, various criteria and parameters are
checked and ultimately concluding on the diagnosis.
The parameters can considered as the:
 Deficiency of Fluid Volume- Kiley’s mother when brought to the emergency department
reported that Kiley was having loose, watery, grainy stool for more than eight times and
that she had soiled many disposable diapers on as soon as being applied. Moreover, the
patient appeared weak and the vital signs appeared erratic with, temperature being 98.90
F, heart rate being very high and rapid 176, blood pressure being 90-58 and the
respiratory rate being 56 (Lopes et al, 2017). The vital signs were again assessed and the
observations of excessive dry and mottled skin was observed. The baby was observed to
be very lethargic as well and the eyes appeared to be sunken and the skin was too cool to
touch. In order to determine the condition of the baby further tests were performed,
which showed that the baby’s body was deprived of water and was dehydrated. The main
goal here was to maximize the fluid content of the baby’s body.
 Imbalance in nutrition less than body requirements- The condition is checked and the
baby was seen to be under inadequate intake of nutrition or breast milk (Teixeira et al,
2016). The baby was observed of being extremely lethargic and that there was an