Introduction to Professional Practice

This document provides an introduction to professional practice, discussing the principles of patient-centered care and the importance of engagement, empathy, education, and enlisting. It also explores barriers to healthcare in indigenous communities in Australia. The document emphasizes the need for cultural sensitivity and patient involvement in decision-making. The subject is Introduction to Professional Practice, and the document type is an essay.

Running head: INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
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1INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
Part A
Question 1
The midwife Michelle, demonstrated inconsistency with patient centered care, which
include principles of engaging, empathizing, educating and enlisting (Tongue, Epps & Forese,
2005). Engagement requires that the clinician in question develops rapport and a positive
therapeutic relationship with the patient, by adhering to empathetic listening and inquiring the
patient of their personal experiences (Moore et al., 2015). Michelle made no attempts whatsoever
on knowing Kaylene’s experiences with her previous pregnancy and directly proceeded to ask
questions on the father of her baby - resulting in an alarming harm to patient privacy and
confidentiality. Empathizing is associated with the health professional directly involving the
patient’s personalized needs into the decision-making process and care plan development
(Bauchat, Seropian & Jeffries, 2016). Michelle displayed no enthusiasm to know what may have
contributed to Kaylene’s dislike towards attending a hospital and made no attempts to involve
this emotional need of her in the maternal care plan. The principle of education in patient
centered care requires the health professional to provide appropriate information to the patient
(Oh & Ell, 2018). It can be observed that Michelle did not adequately educate or explain Kaylene
on the how she may quit smoking and the ways in which it may benefit the growth and
development of the baby. Enlisting requires involving the patient in the decision-making process
which Michelle did not adhere to (Moore et al., 2016). She merely informed Kaylene of the need
to attend to hospital and a healthy diet without any attempt to involve Kaylene’s and her mother
views concerning the same and even largely ignored Corrine’s opinion on the diet she provides
to her daughter.

2INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
Question 2
In this video, it is evident that Michelle adequately adhered to the patient centered
principles of engagement, empathy, education and enlistment. Engagement in patient centered
care involves building a rapport with the patient and engaging in empathetic interpersonal
communication which results in the patient feeling safe, secure, dignified and cared for (Frank et
al., 2015). Hence, as compared to the previous situation, Michelle demonstrated a significant
change by engaging in an interactive session and allowing Kaylene to express her experiences of
her previous pregnancy and on her feelings considering her present condition and her
apprehension towards hospital based treatment. The patient centered principle of empathy
demonstrates health professional’s eagerness to understand the situation by being in the patient’s
shoes followed by demonstration of involving the patient’s personal views and experiences. This
not only results in improved therapeutic relationships but also ensures that the patient is feeling
that his or her needs are being adhered (Haley et al., 2017). In the video, Michelle demonstrates a
significant change by patiently understanding Kaylene’s reasons for not engaging in a hospital
and also involves her needs by ensuring that she need not engage in a hospital to receive
adequate maternity care. Patient centered principles of education and enlisting, involves
educating the patient on reasons underlying healthcare interventions and involving the patient in
the decision-making process (Hadden et al., 2018). Michelle actively adheres to the same, by
educating Kaylene on effects and strategies of smoking cessation as well as using family
centered approaches of involving her mother’s culinary preferences in cooking and nutritional
sessions, followed by involving Kaylene’s consent in referring her to a counselor.

3INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
Section B
The article by Kowal and Paradies (2010), aims to discuss extensively on the salient
barriers present which may be contributing to increasing disparities in healthcare and lack of
effectiveness of health interventions aimed at health promotion and eradication health problems
in the indigenous communities in Australia. The authors examined and postulated that the major
barriers which prevent the indigenous communities of Australia to engage in health promotional
interventions like cardiac rehabilitation can be grouped under: lack of consideration of
sociocultural needs of Aboriginals in heath promotional program, the presence of an extensive
history posing as restrictions to engage in non-indigenous health services and the need to adhere
to familial responsibilities which may go against the heath behavior changes proposed by health
promotional programs. One of the key reasons contributing to lack of participation in health
interventions by indigenous communities is the presence of varied perceptions of health which
are diverse than mainstream societies recommendations. This can be observed in indigenous
communities considering illness as normal life characteristics and perceiving exercises such as
walking to mitigate health issues as absurd. Such healthcare perceptions coupled with the fear of
exclusion from their community often emerges as barriers to healthcare participation as is
observed extensively in smoking playing a key role in enhancing social connections. Further, the
prevalent notion that indigenous communities are disadvantaged and lack low health literacy
further acts as barriers by discouraging their participation in healthcare interventions. Health
professionals must accept that such tensions are inevitable in indigenous health promotion and
ensure consideration of cultural differences, increasing health disparities and importance of
‘social fabric’ in improving the health status of Australian indigenous communities.

4INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
Section C
Patient centered care necessitates adherence to engagement, empathy, education and
enlisting (Tongue, Epps & Forese, 2005). Engagement necessitates development of a rapport
with the patient which results in a positive therapeutic relationship and emotional wellbeing in
the patient (Tang et al., 2016). An absence can be observed in the first video where the GP shows
no interest as the patient enthusiastically shares her life details in good humor resulting in the
patient feeling uneasy. In contrast positive emotions are seen in the patient after the GP actively
converses with her considering her husband’s health and her interest towards alcohol
consumption. Empathy involves direct inclusion of patient’s needs resulting in reduction of
patient distress (Paul-Savoie et al., 2018). The GP shows no concern on the patient’s fear of
amputation and her hip while contrastingly, in the second video, he actively reassures her of the
benefits of diabetic self management and consideration of her hip issues during exercise.
Education involves improving patient’s health literacy which the GP actively inculcates in the
second video by teaching the patient on concepts of self management, blood pressure (BP),
hypoglycemic symptoms and medication effects, as compared to an absence of the same in the
second video where even informing BP levels to the patient was absent (Kogan, Wilber &
Mosqueda, 2016).Enlisting involves direct incorporation of patient needs in decision-making
process (Smith, 2017). In contrast to the first video, in the second video, the GP provides a
multidisciplinary approach by involving patient needs of exercise and diet in diabetic
management as well as ensuring that her needs of alcohol, glucose monitoring and hip will be
met by the diabetic educator, exercise specialist and moderate alcohol consumption.

5INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
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6INTRODUCTION TO PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE
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