Reflection on Nursing Professional Issue

Running head: REFLECTION ON NURSING PROFESSIONAL ISSUE
REFLECTION ON NURSING PROFESSIONAL ISSUE
Name of Student:
Name of University:
Author’s Note:

REFLECTION ON NURSING PROFESSIONAL ISSUE
1
Introduction
This reflective essay aims to highlight how lack of confidence and assertiveness affected
the student nurse whilst faced with a challenge in a surgical ward, during her placement. In this
reflection, I will show the incidence of surgical ward in care of patient who has undergone hip
replacement that helped me to become compassionate, assertive and confident in my nursing
skills. Patient will be referred to as Debbie maintain confidentiality and privacy of information of
patient, which has followed the standards, and code of nursing and midwifery guideline of giving
respect to right to confidentiality (Nursing and Midwifery Council 2018).
What
Nursing experience
In my nursing profession, I was working in general surgery unit of Kingston hospital. I
was assigned to give post-operative care to a patient named Debbie of 60 years-old female, who
had undergone hip replacement surgery. The patient had diabetes and post-operation she was
showing major health complication. Debbie’s granddaughter Suzan (pseudonyms) is the primary
caregiver for her and takes all the crucial medical decisions for her. My aim was to relieve the
pain of the patient and provide competent care. I was working with a senior nursing practitioner
to provide post-operative assistance to Debbie. I was instructed by her to take vital signs
immediately and change the dressing of the patient. While I was taking vital sign, I was
questioned in every step of my action. Suzan was commenting and yelling that I am not doing it
in the right way and asking to assign a proper nurse. Even my senior nurse was supporting
Suzan. I was feeling bullied, distraught and tearful with the behaviour of my nursing team and
patient family. The nurse practitioner replied in an aggressive manner, as I was not able to dress

REFLECTION ON NURSING PROFESSIONAL ISSUE
2
the wound efficiently. I being a student nurse, lacked in many nursing skill for it so I was not
able to confidently advocate for myself. Instead of being supported, I was upset that I was taken
over by my mentor. I was not able to perform my duty with full competency. I was powerless to
keep my viewpoint and opinion with self-confidence. The professional issue of assertiveness was
prevailing in the care of the patient. My work was to give patient-centred care in the surgical
unit, but I was not being supported by my colleague which was needed to develop professional
competence and confidence.
So what
Identification of the challenge
It is evident that nurses play a major role in giving effective care to the patient and
maintain patient dignity as outline by NMC (Nursing and Midwifery Council, 2018). The
primary nursing goal in this scenario was to control the pain and provide post-operative care to
Debbie. From the scenario, the feeling of inadequacy and lack of assertiveness arose because I
was not feeling encouraged in my work. I was clueless how to react in such situation where my
mentor was trying to pull me to down in front of the patient and their family. The strong
assertion by Suzan of being patient’s granddaughter and sole caregiver was negatively
influencing my practice and confidence. However, the intervention by the mentor and Suzan on
every aspect of nursing care were pulling me down. Thus, the challenge identified in the case
scenario is a professional issue of not being assertive, as it is evident that lack of assertiveness
can increase the chance of health deterioration of the patient (Goss et al., 2017).