Nursing Placements: A Student's Experience with Diabetes Care

During a nursing placement, a student cared for a patient with diabetes. The experience taught the student about the importance of family support, seeking assistance from other professionals, and proper medication management. The student plans to use these lessons in future patient care.

Running Head: NURSING 1
Nursing
Names
Institution

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Introduction
Nursing placements, students who pursue nursing courses experience many things that
they have never experienced before, and this prepares them to learn more and perfect their
profession. According to Natasha (2013), some of these things may be positive while others
negative, and therefore requires nurses to use both clinical and non-clinical skills in order to be
able to overcome those that may prevent them from attaining their goals. Because nurses have
the role of taking care of patients to the best of their abilities to ensure that they get good
services, it is always good to overcome all barriers which affect caregiving and focus on
delivering positive results (Sophie, 2017).
Description
During my placement, I came across various situations which helped me to advance my
knowledge in this field. For example, in one incidence, there was a patient who was brought to
the health center in a critical condition. After being diagnosed, it was found that he had diabetes.
Because the hospital had a shortage of nurses, I was given the task of taking care of this patient
through ensuring that he takes right dosage, feels motivated, and also making his family
members to feel at ease. According to Daniela (2013), being a nurse requires one to use various
skills to ensure that people have hopes in recovery even if the situations appear very serious. In
this case, I was supposed to employ various skills such as communication, interpersonal, and
problem-solving skills.
After the admission of this patient, none of the family members came to check on him
and this appeared to affect him in various ways. For this reason, the hospital management had to

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plead with his relatives to show love and give the patients hopes that mediation would work for
him.
Feeling
Being my first time to be involved in caring for a patient with a chronic illness, this was
not an easy task because there were so many things that I was not familiar with. Initially, I had
fear for the unknown because there were so many things that were crossing my mind. For
example, I kept wondering what if I do what is not supposed to be done. However, after
sometimes, I gained confidence because the various classes that I had undergone at the university
had given me good knowledge concerning how to similar tasks.
Although I felt what I was doing was right, like for example ensuring the patient takes the
right dosage as prescribed by the doctor, I had a hard time because I felt for the patient
considering that he was very ill. I also kept feeling that his family did not deserve the pain it was
undergoing through thinking that the life of their own was in danger. Although these kinds of
feelings were affecting me in various ways, they also made me to do things beyond expectations
because my goal, in this case, was to save the life of this patient.
During this time, I realized various things that made me to come up with various
opinions. For example, I noticed that lack of family closeness when one is sick may worsen the
condition. This factor made me to trust Ann (2013) that the closeness of family members and
friends when one is sick plays a crucial role in making patients to feel that there is hope and this
prevents them from developing other conditions. My opinion, in this case, is that people should
visit their sick family members and friends from time to time in order to show them that they are,
and also to give them hopes for recovery.

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Evaluation
Although I faced various challenges while taking care of this patient, most of the things
that I did to save the life of this patient worked well. For example, I was able to assist the patient
to take medication in the right manner irrespective of the fact that he was in a condition which he
could not realize what is mediation and how to take it. I was also able to help the patient to take a
diet that would not pose a risk to his health condition and this played a crucial role in enabling
him to feel better.
Because there appeared to be a conflict between the patient and his family members my
approach to helping his relatives understand the importance of showing the patient love and
hopes for recovery bored positive results as after using the hospital management to talk with
them they started visited the patient. The other thing that worked well is seeking directions and
assistance from other practitioners as this was my first time to care of a patient with a chronic
condition.
Analysis
According to Kurt (2014), diabetes is one of the illnesses which has existed for decades
but people have little understanding about it. Being involved in taking care of this patient, I
realized various things concerning people who live with this kind of chronic illness. For
example, I was able to realize that this illness is highly influenced by various factors such as diet,
family history, moods and so forth. I also realized that this condition requires patients to undergo
medical check-ups such as blood sugar test, and other conditions which may put a patient into
risk.

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Taking care of this patient changed my opinion concerning patients with chronic diseases
and especially those with diabetes. Initially, I had a perception that these diseases are hard to
manage especially when the patient is at risky condition but after taking care of this patient for
some days I realized that they can be managed if the right medication is given and other factors
such as good diet are considered.
According to Heather (2012), taking care of patients during placements helps nursing
students to enhance their profession by experiencing new things. Caring for this patient assisted
me to realize that in the medical field, it is good to work with others and seek assistance in
matters which one does not understand. This is because, initially, I did not know what to do
because I had no experience, but after working with other professionals who have been in this
field for some time, things worked out well and the patient managed to recover under my care.
In the recent studies, it has been found out that deaths related diabetic has been increasing
due to several factors such as lack of regular medial cheek ups, bad diet, failing to follow
medical guidelines as directed by physicians and other factors (Voncella, 2011). From this
experience, I realized that diabetes is a dangerous disease and therefore people need to consider
these factors to ensure they manage this disease.
Action Plan
According to Hazel & Jill (2015), chronic diseases require attention because they can be
life-threatening. Although I did not experience major barriers in giving care to this patient, I feel
that in the future I should use better strategies to make a patient recover within the shortest time
possible. One of the strategies that I plan to use is joining the patient’s family to show him/her
that the illness is not the end of everything because medication gives hope that his/her life will

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continue. I also plan to do extensive research on how to care for patients with chronic diseases
especially those who receive little support from their family members.
Conclusion
From this experience, I learned various things that I believe shall assist me in my
profession. For example, I noticed that making use of the knowledge obtained from the course I
have undergone, as well as seeking assistance from other professionals who have been in this
field can help me to accomplish things even those that seem to be impossible. The experience
also helped me to realize various things especially in relation to diabetes. For example, I realized
that with proper medication such conditions can be managed, and also learned that family
support is important for patients with chronic illnesses.

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References
Ann, F. M. (2013). Instruments That Measure Nurses' Knowledge about Diabetes: An
Integrative Review. Journal of Nursing Measurement, 21(1), 45-65.
Daniela, A. (2013). Emotional Work and Diversity in Clinical Placements of Nursing Students.
Journal of Nursing Scholarship, 45(2), 14-24.
Hazel, P & Jill, W. (2015). Non-Prescribing Diabetes Nurse Specialist Views of Nurse
Prescribing in Diabetes Health. Nursing Praxis in New Zealand, 31(1), 78-98.
Heather, W. P. (2012). Active-Learning Diabetes Simulation in an Advanced Pharmacy Practice
Experience to Develop Patient Empathy. American Journal of Pharmaceutical
Education, 76(10), 76-89.
Kurt, A. B. (2014). Individualized Health Care: Moving from Population Health to Care of the
One. Inquiry, 51(1), 45-54.
Natasha, F. (2013). Clinical Supervision in Undergraduate Nursing Students: A Review of the
Literature. e-Journal of Business Education and Scholarship Teaching, 7(1), 132-145.
Sophie, C. (2017). Addressing Asia's Fast Growing Diabetes Epidemic. Bulletin of the World
Health Organization, 95(8), 76-89.
Voncella, M. (2011). Health Literacy and Its Association with Diabetes Knowledge, Self-
Efficacy and Disease Self-Management among African Americans
with Diabetes Mellitus. ABNF Journal, 22(2), 67-80.