Post-Operative Care and Clinical Issues in Nursing Assignment

Running head: NURSING ASSIGNMENT
NURSING ASSIGNMENT
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

NURSING ASSIGNMENT1
Introduction
The post-operative care refers to management of the health conditions of the patient after
the surgery is over. This consists of providing care in the post-operative period both in the
operation theatre and in the days following the surgery. A patient who has just undergone a
surgery need proper and appropriate care plan in order to avoid any kind of post-operative
complications. The post-operative complications may or may not be related with the disease or
with the surgery that the patient had undergone. In severe conditions the patients are send to the
intensive care unit for further close monitoring. In the intensive care units the clinical staffs
mostly look after the patients minute by minute. While preparing the care plan the patient must
be assessed properly and in the basis of the results of the assessments appropriate interventions
must be taken. This assignment is going to deal with the care plan of a 76 years old man who
had recently undergone a right total knee replacement. This assignment is also dealing with the
potential clinical issues potential clinical in relation to the case studies and also the discharge
plan of the patient.
Part A
The patient of the case study is a man of 76 years of age who was admitted to the hospital
for a right total knee replacement. He was sent to the ward after 21 hours. The value of the vital
signs got changed after the operation. The blood pressure became 100/54, the heart rate increased
106. The respiratory rate got decrease to 12 beats per minute and the sedation score was 1-2. The
patient was administered simvastatin, paracetamol, captopril, ranitidine, aspirin and morphine.
The joint replacements are indicated by the irreversible damages of the joints associated
with the loosing of the functions. The damages also includes severe pain, certain fractures ad

NURSING ASSIGNMENT2
congenital hip disorders. Total joint replacements can be performed in any joints except on the
spine (Viola, Gomez, Restrepo, Maltenfort & Parvizi, 2015).
The patient after the surgery is over need a proper and health diet. The patient will not be
able to walk after the surgery over. Before getting discharged from the hospital a physiotherapist
must provide recommendations to the patient which must be followed after the surgery. Apart
from that, the patient proper exercises as well as daily movements for regaining the health and
also to get started in the normal daily activities. After the surgery it is very important for the
patient to be provided with anticoagulant medicines which will reduce the formation of blood
clots (Werner, Evans, Carothers & Browne, 2015).
In the given case, the vital signs got changed, the blood pressure got reduced, and the
heart rate increased and respiratory rate got decreased. The nurse must assess whether the patient
had any risk of infection or not. The nurse must also assess the patient had been suffering from
impair physical mobility or not. Another most important nursing assessments is the measurement
of acute pain and the risk of neurovascular dysfunction.
The three most important clinical issues associated with the right knee replacement along with
the interventions are described below:
 Risk of infections- The interventions and rationales are described below:
Interventions Rationales
Assessing the capillary refill and the color
of the skin
The reasons for assessing this are reduced
or absent of pulses, delayed capillary refill
time, pallor, cyanosis, blanching and
coldness of skin reflect diminished

NURSING ASSIGNMENT3
circulation or perfusion (Schweizer et al.,
2015)
Assessing the motion and sensation of
operated extremity
Increased in pain, numbness or stinging,
inability to perform probable movements
suggest nerve injury, cooperated
circulation, or dislocation of the prosthesis,
requiring immediate intervention (Crowe, et
al., 2015).
Monitoring and recording vital signs. The reason for measuring the vital signs is
that tachycardia and reduced blood pressure
may reflect the response to hypovolemia or
blood loss and suggest
to anaphylaxis related to absorption of
methyl methacrylate into the systemic
circulation. However this happens rarely as
the advent of prosthetics with a porous
layer which increase the rate of growth
(Crowe, et al., 2015)..
 Impaired physical mobility- The interventions and the rationales are described below
Interventions Rationales
Proper medicating before the procedures
and activities
The reasons behind this is that the muscle
relaxant, analgesics and narcotics decrease