Nursing Burnout and Self-Care Strategies

This assignment delves into the critical issue of burnout among nurses, particularly those in critical care settings. It requires a comprehensive review of academic literature focusing on the causes and consequences of nurse burnout. Furthermore, the analysis should examine various self-care strategies employed by nurses to manage stress and promote well-being. The emphasis is on evaluating the effectiveness of these strategies based on existing research findings.

Running head: SELF CARE RECOVERY PLAN OF A NURSE
SELF CARE RECOVERY PLAN OF A NURSE
Name of the Student
Name of the university
Author’s note

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Introduction
Self care is essential for all type of people belonging to different professions. Nurses are
subjected to several physical and mental stresses like vicarious trauma, burnout and compassion
fatigue. To cope up with the stress, many of them fall prey to drugs and alcohol. It is important
for the registered nurses as well as the nursing students. (Bakibinga, Vinje & Mittelmark, 2012).
It is necessary for a caregiver to observe her own limits and think about her own psychological
well being.
In order to accomplish this, we have tried to chalk out a self care plan as a nurse.
Task 1. Plan and Action
Planning phase
 Identify an issue for change
 As a nursing student, I am sometimes faced with anxiety and stress, which can be due to
the extreme work pressure or can be due to the compassion related anxiety. The stress
not only hampers my physical well being but also reduces the drive for working. Once I
got addicted to alcohol in order to manage the work stress.
 Due to my reluctance in taking food in time due to work load and lack of time, I am
suffering from health issues like loss of weight and indigestion.
 Enlist Supporters:
 My family- Although my entire friends circle and my family members are supportive, yet
my mother had been always playing a supportive role when it comes to my well being.

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So she would be the appropriate person for helping me to come to the normal track of life
and to stick to the recovery regimen.
 Another person who would help me is my counselor, who has already treated me in some
of my past cases.
 Self care recovery plan
 What area of your life you want to work on
I am a nursing student and have been trying to thrive in the competitive environment. For the
first few days I really had trouble to manage everything simultaneously. One of my problems is
that, I can’t say a “no”, be it a case of helping out your peers, or helping out a patient by pushing
your limits, till I understood that one cannot manage everything simultaneously (Vivienne et al.,
2014). I became addicted to alcohol. The extreme work load has created anxiety and stress in me
that has substantially decreased my drive for work and have also created health issues such as
weight loss and indigestion (Bevans & Sternberg, 2012). The aim of this self recovery plan is to
manage stresses and the health issues, such that I can increase my efforts to give proper care to
the patient.
 What are your goal(s)?
 Quitting any addictions and leading a healthy life.
 Taking time for myself.
 Spending more time with family, friends and being intimate with the ones we love.
 Getting ample amount of rest after the work.
 Getting daily exercises
 Pursuing other dreams than nursing

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 Creating self esteem, self confidence and creation of a personal support system for
myself.
 Celebrating accomplishment, how big or small it might be.
 What supports you have in place and the role they will play
I have seeked support from my family members and my counselor who have prepared a
recovery plan for me. They have tried their best to help me to achieve my recovery goals. They
have tried to provide me with medications to help quit alcohols. They have tried to provide a
conducive environment for me so that I can share what is troubling me. My counselor had
chalked out nutritional charts and other medications for me. My mother made it sure that I am
not too much stressed, so that I get a proper sleep and food. She has forcefully kept me away
from some day’s work so that I get some time for myself (Bevans & Sternberg, 2012).
 What challenges you may face and possible ways of addressing these?
The consumer or the patient or the organization for which you are working might develop
misconception regarding your efficiency and might think that I am not providing proper attention
and is busy with my own health (Blum, 2014).
It has to be kept in mind that people suffer from several withdrawal effects on quitting drugs or
other forms of addictives suddenly. During the recovery session, I was often faced with strong
desires to have alcohol and have had periods of anxiety for being away from alcohol, I was
irritated and agitated.
Task 2 refection

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To improve my mental and physical health status, my family, friends and my counselor
had played an important part. Each time I interacted with my counselor, I was provided with a
session that was refreshing and was friendly (Reeve et al., 2013). It really helped me a lot to
open up and share my grievances. My mother and my friends made it sure that I do not get
indulged in any sort of care giving practice during my recovery process. They always tried to
provide me with a happy and a stress free environment. My mother made it sure that I adhere to
the therapies and medications regarding alcohol withdrawal (Raab, 2014). She insisted that I do
meditations daily and have nutritious food.
My journey was extremely good, as far as the supporters were there.
It was the support that I got from my family and my counselor that had helped is to deal
with the hurdles during the recovery plan.
As mentioned earlier, self care is important for the personal health. It is also linked with the
professional growth. It is essential to practice self care in order to combat stress and to promote
health to practice. It is the duty of the nurses to care for the others, but the nurses often don’t get
time to think or look after their own well being (Nahm, Warren, Zhu & Brown, 2012). Nurses
are often reluctant to bring out the time for them to practice self care. This reluctance not only
hampers the physical well being at some point of their life but also affects their mental well
being. This can not only hamper their professional life but also hamper their personal life. The
most reasons for the stresses are the unable to see the pain faced by the patients, unable to deliver
the appropriate care to the patient, lack of attention to the own health (Nahm, Warren, Zhu &
Brown, 2012). It is important to implement daily self-care and the self healing strategies to

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transform the academic setting and the healthcare workplace into a caring-healing sustainable
environment.
Though I am satisfied with my role as nurse, I am sometimes faced with extreme work
stress, which hampers my physical and emotional well being. This happens when I am unable to
deliver an appropriate care to the patient and see the patient suffering.
Nursing self care can vary from nurses to nurses. For some nurses, going to a church
along with pastoral service can be like balm for the soul, for other nurse it might be hiking, or
going out on a movie or on a picnic with the peers. All this can bring about reduction in the
stress. My peers have organized day outs so that I can remain distracted and keep away from any
sort of addictives. It is important that the caregivers should go beyond their own capacity levels
to provide a type of care that is appropriate for the patient, but a professional always cannot go
beyond certain barriers, even if it can pose detrimental effects on her career (Epp, 2012). As
mentioned in the action plan before, extensive support from my families and my loved ones will
be successful in bringing down the stress level in me, and helped me a lot to quit alcohol.
Relaxation tools such as meditation, yoga, deep breathing, mindfulness and enchanting of
mantras are also good stress relievers.
In several cases, we are faced with situations where the life and death of a person totally
rests on my capacity or efficiency; it becomes very difficult for me to cope up with the
continuous pressure in my mind, which ultimately affects the care approach to the patient. In
order to cope up with the stress I often face social withdrawal (Peters et al., 2012). Spending time
with friends and loved ones can actually bring down one’s anxiety level. One can share problems
regarding the anxiety with her circle of friends or the family. I will definitely try to manage out

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more time for my peers as it would help me to cope up with my work stress (Nahm, Warren, Zhu
& Brown, 2012).
Most of the nurses also faced food deficiency, which can be due to lack of time for their
own self. I have observed that my reluctance in taking good nutrition during the work hours have
affected my physical well being and have reduced my work force and I have been dealing with
underweight issues. I should keep in mind that physical well being is proportional to the working
capacity of a person. I would consult a dietician for proper diet chart in order to ensure sufficient
nutrition (Nahm, Warren, Zhu & Brown, 2012).
Proper exercises are also connected to good physical and mental health. Exercises, ample
amount of sleep are needed by all, irrespective of patients and health care professionals. I would
definitely try to follow a proper self care routine to ensure good food, daily exercises and
sufficient sleep in order to improve my health condition (Sharoni & Wu, 2012).
Furthermore, it can be said that a joint approach taken up by the concerned nurse and her family
can bring about improvement in the life style of the nurses, when it comes to self care. In this
report I have taken the help from my mother and a counselor who have been successful in
bringing me on the right track and are continuously trying, so that I stick to the right choices.

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References
Bakibinga, P., Vinje, H. F., & Mittelmark, M. B. (2012). Self-tuning for job engagement:
Ugandan nurses' self-care strategies in coping with work stress. International Journal of
Mental Health Promotion, 14(1), 3-12.http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14623730.2012.682754
Bevans, M., & Sternberg, E. M. (2012). Caregiving burden, stress, and health effects among
family caregivers of adult cancer patients. Jama, 307(4), 398-403.
doi:10.1001/jama.2012.29
Blum, C. (2014). Practicing self-care for nurses: A nursing program initiative. OJIN: The Online
Journal of Issues in Nursing, 19(3). DOI: 10.3912/OJIN.Vol19No03Man03
Epp, K. B. G. N. (2012). Burnout in critical care nurses: a literature review. Dynamics, 23(4), 25-
31. https://www.caccn.ca/en/pdfs/CACCN-23-4-2012.pdf#page=25
Nahm, E. S., Warren, J., Zhu, S., An, M., & Brown, J. (2012). Nurses' self-care behaviors related
to weight and stress. Nursing outlook, 60(5), e23-e31.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.outlook.2012.04.005
Peters, L., Cant, R., Sellick, K., O’Connor, M., Lee, S., Burney, S., & Karimi, L. (2012). Is work
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