Analyzing Reflective Practices and CPD in Health and Social Care

This report delves into the significance of reflective practices and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) within the health and social care sector. It highlights the crucial role of CPD in ensuring healthcare professionals maintain up-to-date knowledge and skills, ultimately enhancing the quality of patient care. The report covers standards associated with professional development, emphasizing effective communication, confidentiality, problem-solving, and empathy. It explores theoretical perspectives on reflection, including Kolb's experimental learning theory and Gibbs' model of reflection, detailing how these models support professional growth. Furthermore, the report identifies methods for acknowledging and planning professional development needs, such as industry training, job-specific training, and personal development initiatives. It also addresses the importance of aligning training with organizational objectives and fostering a culture of continuous learning. The report concludes by underscoring the benefits of CPD for employees, employers, and patients alike, emphasizing its contribution to a skilled, motivated workforce and improved healthcare outcomes. Desklib provides access to this and many other solved assignments.

Reflective Practices

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
TASK...............................................................................................................................................3
1.2 CPD within the health and social care...................................................................................3
1.1 Standards associating to professional development...............................................................4
2.1 Theoretical perspectives on reflection...................................................................................5
4.2 Methods utilised to acknowledge and plan for professional development needs..................6
2.2 Reflective practice supports the professional development...................................................7
2.3 Assess how reflective practice helps in positive results........................................................8
4.1 Sources of support for learning and development.................................................................8
4.1 Professional development opportunities................................................................................9
3.1 Health and social care practitioner’s own believes, values and experience......................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12
Books and Journals:...................................................................................................................12
Online:.......................................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Personal and professional development signifies the value in every individual's life. It
defines the route to measure own knowledge, competencies and skills, consider their aspirations
in life while setting objectives to realise and increase their actual potential. A professional
individual requires to undertake continue professional development or CPD which make sure
that the knowledge base stays up-to-date for the person to be capable and able to practise. In any
organisational setting, a clear conclusion from PPD procedure would be to accomplish a career
change or promotion, or the increase of hard and soft skills (Dixon and Battle-Edwards, 2022). In
an individual life, the person may identify the areas that have space for the enhancement and the
journey of PPDP could let that person to enjoy a more completing existence. The following
presentation is based on the role of practitioner in health and social care sector. This presentation
will cover various aspects such as continuing professional development within the chosen field.
It will highlight the standards connecting to professional development. It will also demonstrate
the theoretical perspectives on reflection. A number of methods exploited to understand and plan
for professional development requirements. Reflective practice also helps in positive results for
singles, parents, staff members, careers and other professionals. It will also represent the sources
of support for leaning and development. Acknowledgement of professional development
opportunities is also a part of this report.
TASK
1.2 CPD within the health and social care.
Continuing professional development (CPD) can be delineated as any activity that
enhances development and learning while increasing the person's ability to practise effectively
and safely. The main aim of occupational evolution within the health and social care is to make
sure the attribute of care that customers and patients get is of the greatest standards. Those health
care employees who need professional registration such as qualified doctors or nurses will be
needed to confront CPD as concern of the enrollment renewal of process (Eyres, 2021). The
regulatory or professional body will need information on the regulations that must be met,
consisting how many hours of CPD must be confiscated, in what scope or how it must be filmed.
The professional body will give support and proposal required to let CPD to be maintained.
Although CPD is beneficial is several professions, it is similarly crucial in the health and social

care sector as well. It has positive implications for the well-being of public. In this sector, the
main aim of CPD is to improve the superior of care that diligent, together with client receive.
Continuing professional development contributes to catering high quality services and
care. It is beneficial in the health and social care sector as the attribute of care being served
affects straightaway on the public's well-being. Financing in the professional development of an
employee goodness not only those exploiting the services and their family members but also the
employees themselves and the company as a whole (Kearney, 2019).
As an employee the goodness of projecting CPD can enhance the possibilities of
advancement beyond the existing role. With the ongoing alterations within the sector, the
anticipations of employees rise. A multi-tasked employee with the most advanced cognition is
visualised as a significant resource. It may also uphold the employees focused and motivated,
preventing a belief of doldrums in a role.
For the companies, catering opportunities for the growth in career and delineating a keen
interest in their staff member's need for learning as well as development can support in enhanced
hiring and selection. Acknowledging and developing the qualities and workers of employees
goes a long way in making a stable workforce with improved morale.
For customers or patients of health and social care services, they not only have the right
to effective and safe care, but also, it gives reassurance and pleasance to know those affections
for them are taking their care duty on a serious note by making sure the surroundings is
protective and the company is running within the boundaries of legislations (How to Support
Professional Development in Health and Social Care, 2021).
1.1 Standards associating to professional development
Continuing professional development (CPD) is referred to development of knowledge and skills
of person working. Skills that need development are technical, personal, professional, business
and management. The standards of professional development in a health care are:
 Effective communication: Effective communication in between the management and
other working professional is essential for smooth working and quality services. The
effective communication in between the colleagues, health professionals, paramedical
professionals help in their engagement and establish a quality of care for all the patients.
It is essential for professional development as the communication is the key for planning
the strategies as well as for developing a care plan.

 Maintaining confidentiality and privacy: Confidentiality and privacy of patients are
required to be maintained as priority. The nurses in charge as well as other professionals
involved in treatment of patient should withhold their privacy in regards to their type of
treatment as well as the disease condition. They should not disclose any kind of
information to people who don't have any link with the patient's treatment.
 Problem solving skills: Problem solving skills are necessary for professional
development as it eliminates the possibilities of risk. It also proved as beneficial in case
of sudden risk or errors that may rise in during the process. The problem solving skills
are necessary in the scenario of emergency. These skills play a key role in professional
development within the healthcare.
 Empathy: Nurses in charge of patients and other person staff who are directly or in
directly linked with care of patients should have empathy for the patients. The care
principle of empathy defines that the personnel involved should treat patient as an
individual and treat him as per his want.
 Developing the skills: Skill development involves developing the skills involving,
practical and theoretical knowledge of person providing care to patient. It includes
developing their technical, behavioural and learning skills for providing advance
treatment to patients. These skills development are considered as professional
development as there is an overall progress of individual in terms of his/ her services.
2.1 Theoretical perspectives on reflection.
Kolb's experimental learning theory:
This is the theory of experimental learning represents a cyclical model of learning
involving four steps. This model supports individuals to acknowledge what is involved in the
process of reflection and establishes four simple steps to follow in the process.
The four stage of learning cycles are discussed underneath:
 Concrete experience: It refers as the first phase of the procedure of learning where
something has been completed or indulges an experience.
 Reflective observation: This is the second phase after concrete experience has been held
and now it's time to show on that learning or experience. This involves the rational
process of how it went, what did not go well or what went well. It is the stage also relates
with the feedback or review from others.

 Abstract conceptualization: This is the point where summarizations or conclusions have
been done from the process of reflection and choices are created about how alterations
can be done in forthcoming time and what has been learnt from the process.
 Active experiment: This is the final point where the alterations or changes have been
made or new ideas are generated in putting into practices that have been created from the
abstract conceptualization. This then leads back to the starting of the reflective series to
continue acquisition, growth and reflection.
The Kolb's model is important within health and social care as it can stress over a person can
learn in various manner and that the managers can effectively facilitate the learnings of their
workers if they can know their different pathway in which they learn.
Gibbs model of reflection:
In this, the Gibbs model of reflection is generally a cycle of effective reflective actions, where
one can lead to the other one. The model mainly starts with illustrating the specific events and
such reflective actions can consist the cause of the events, the position of the events, context of
the events, its involvement as well as actions of a person. In this, such reflective activity can
generally lead to the second stage of the reflection in the Gibbs model, that is generally the
recalling of the feelings as well as thoughts of a person at a given time duration of the activity. In
addition to this, the third stage of the Gibbs reflective cycle is a evaluation stage of the
happening of the events. In this, such phase can include measuring the occurrence during the
events which can create the good feelings as well as occurrence during the events which can
produce the bad feelings. Within this, the next step in the Gibbs model can involve Analysis step.
In the step, analysis is where a person have the chance to make the sense of what has happened.
Up till now a person have concentrated on the details around what occurrence within the
situation. The fifth step within the Gibbs model can involve conclusion. In the particular section
within model, a person can make effective conclusion about what has happened. In the section
where a person can effectively summarise the learnings as well as can highlight what alterations
to the action of a person can enhance the results within the future. Within this, the last step in the
Gibbs reflection cycle is Action plan. In this, a person can plan for what they will do differently
in association with the situation in the future prospect. The action plan can be quite essential and
helpful as well to think about how a person can aid themselves to act more differently. In
addition to this, a reflection is generally a key part of both personal and professional

enhancement which the care nurses are generally needed in order to undertake to keep the pace
with the altering practice nature.
The reflection can significantly aid ensure the safe as well as effective evidence based care by
simply enabling the care nurses to constantly enhance their skills. The model can specifically
enable a person to better the performance as it is occurring and effectively enhancing it for the
future prospect.
4.2 Methods utilised to acknowledge and plan for professional development needs
Ongoing training and evolution for the all staff should be an intrinsic part of the
organisational culture. Training helps an individual to stay ahead in the competitors by upholding
the up-to-date developments in the sector. It also helps in employee retention which signifies that
nobody will sense that they are in the dead end job. Following are the certain ways or methods
through which skill gaps can be filled in the health and social care:
 Understanding employee training and development: There is a necessity to
acknowledge the category of the training offered by employers to employees:
◦ Industry training: This could cover supporting workers get up to pace on new
goods, equipment or processes.
◦ Job training: The kind of training that assists workers do their work in a better way.
This could be health and safety training for the employees.
◦ Personal development: It is about giving training to the employee behind their
roles. It could involve mental health first aid training, emotional intelligence
training, leadership skills and many more.
 Set clear expectations and objectives: To know training and development
requirements, the employee must set the clear expectations for each role within the
organisation. It develops a standard to supervise performance against. For every
employee of the group, employer require to go beyond the job description. It is the
requirement to fix clear expectations, obligations and aspirations for everyone in the
team. It helps in getting convenience to measure the performance (How to Identify
Employee Training and Development Needs, 2022).
 Create personal development plans: This signifies as the intrinsic part of the
employee retention, job satisfaction as well as worker engagement. Creating an
effectively PDP for every employee will help in making them sense that employers are

more involved into them. It also helps in knowing the training requirements while
improving communication with the employees.
 Use focus groups to understand training and development needs: Focus groups are
the beneficial tool to assist in knowing the training and development requirements
within the organisation. A focus group sees at the fussy area of workers within the
health and social care under the supervision of an proficient facilitator. They are
beneficial of assembling workers' opinions and perceptions about present training and
how to enhance what is on offer. These kind of groups also represent that the employer
are seriously interested in their subordinates' ideas (Voelker, 2; 022).
Other methods which can be utilised in order to acknowledge and develop professional plans,
which are: Setting up the goals and targets: Setting up the correct goals and targets is beneficial to
achieve the process with quality. The process is also essential to eliminate possible risk
that can rise in during the process. Taking the actions in order to achieve the set goals and targets: In order to achieve the
desired goals and targets the people involved should take necessary actions. The process
involves engagement of all the people of working place, in referral to the health care
sector the process require engagement of health care professionals as well as patients and
other medical staff to develop professional needs. Resources availability: Resources are essential for achieving the goal, planning and
acknowledging the professional development needs. Availability of resources should
examined in during the strategy planning. The process helps eliminating the risk and
complete the process in given timeline. Creating individual development plans: Individual development plans are essential for
developing the learning process of employees and enhancing their current knowledge.
The healthcare sectors should conduct individual development plans for developing the
skills of professionals as well as other related employees to provide better services.
 Cross- training: Cross training is given to professionals and related staff to perform job
duties other than those that they daily perform in order to develop their other skills. Cross
training is essential in healthcare for immediate advancement, and in case the particular
provider is not at field.

2.2 Reflective practice supports the professional development
Reflective practice defines the thinking or reflection about own actions. It is a similar
idea of learning from one's experience where one person can show on what he or she did, what
come about and make a choice in future based on the acquisition from the experiences. In the
following ways health and social care employee develop and use reflective practice:
 Make a habit of reading about the headings which the person is learning about or desire
to learn in upcoming days.
 The individual should make it a habit to ask others about the way when they complete
their things and reason behind it (Næsheim-Bj and Larssen, 2019).
 Learn to focus on the sentiments, what prompts them, or how he or she tend to deal with
negative emotions.
Key benefits of reflective practice:
 It supports in boosting self-awareness as it is main element in emotional intelligence
which assists in creating a good understanding of others.
 It supports in developing creative thinking competencies. It also makes the individual to
actively participate in the work process.
 It helps in building a habit of learning journal for the practice of reflection for different
work situations
The time the health and social care employee spend on the reflective practice will make
sure that he or she able to focus on the things that are vital, both to the person, family and
company. It is a great tool to learning experience in context to the life and work experiences.
2.3 Assess how reflective practice helps in positive results.
It has been analysed that reflective practice involves ample benefits in heighten self-
awareness which is the chief factor of emotional intelligence as well as in generating a better
understanding of others. This kind of practice supports a person to develop critical thinking skills
while encouraging active engagement in work processes. In organisational setting, upholding a
learning journal and ongoing exploitation of reflective practice will help more meaningful
decisions about personal development as well as career development including at professional
appraisal time. It will also support to cater and individual with examples to exploit in
competency based interview situations. Reflection is a significant part of the practice and will
benefit the children in establishment and their parents as well as guardians. The person will

benefit both professionally and individually. Reflective practice will help in maintain and
ongoing improvement. Through reflective practice and continual improvement an individual will
accomplished better and positive results for children such as their individual needs are fulfilled
their self-esteem is also enhanced. It will also help in providing interactive and appropriate
environment and compassing suitable resources for them and indoor and outdoor opportunities.
The reflective practice will also profit guardians and parents as they will be able to witness
alterations and modifications in the reflective exercise by sensing confident that the care the
individual caters is of high quality and will constantly enhancing. Continually reflective practice
will improve skills such as motivation and confidence level, it will also help in taking the
ownership of the reflective practice while identifying several professional development
requirements (Thompson, 2021). This will then translate into improvements of setting improving
the reputation make sure that the individual more efficient and enabling the individual positive
outcomes are more clearly.
Reflection help in continuation of professional development by following ways:
Self-awareness: A practitioner must identify his own skill and qualities to treat patients
with care and to maintain their well-being. Positive self-awareness is related with positive
thinking and development as it enhance the ability of one to achieve the goals and also it
contributes significantly in social development,
Positive Outcomes: Practitioner's success is dependent on positive outcomes. In CPD
positive outcomes are necessary to provide benefits to both patients and practitioners. Positive
outcomes make sure that every step of treatment is effective and significant.
Development Planning: Planning for development helps practitioner to achieve their
training within CPD, as it provide opportunities to plan and organise.
Reflective practitioner: Reflective practitioner is related with improvement and
development of practitioners within the healthcare in order to reflect the standard of care on
patients.
4.1 Sources of support for learning and development.
Professional development can be defined as the vital concern of a health and social care
role of employees. It is essential to aid updated with dynamic legislation, together with best
practices and there is always space to enhance. It is circumspect to have a groovy apprehension
of the support sources available to support with erudition and evolution.

 Manager: Possibly the best source of assistance for own erudition and evolution is the
manager. The employee will have ongoing direction and guidance and a yearly appraisal
to handle any grooming that employee and employer think could good from and to deal
with the individual development aspirations. The employee should create meetings by
preparing notes of any issues that they had, imperative concerns should be reported on
prior basis, the manager should grant feedback and guidance about how they can enhance
their practice in the health and social care sector.
 Teams and co-workers: Team meetings are the greatest opportunities for the employee
and other team-mates to learn mutually and together. An employee is able to express and
share thoughts while dealing with common problems and find appropriate solutions. Co-
workers can also be a source of support (formally and informally) by offering guidance
and advice or giving feedback.
 Feedback from others: As well as getting response from the association, sharing things
with the individual that the help, along with other occupational group from the care sector
can be the vital informant of information. The respectives that cater care or their family
or friends will be able to elaborate to know how the practice influence them. Other
occupational groups may be able to give details about the changes in domestic policies or
training opportunities in area.
 Mentors or tutors: For some of the individuals, the mentor can be pivotal source of
learning and developing. This is anyone who is efficient at their role or job whiling
indulging someone advice or pointers about the work and how it could complete it better.
The individual can also learn through observations while integrated the good practice into
own practice.
 Formal support: Formal support is the support provided to patients when healthcare
practitioner do their practices at hospitals while obeying the rules.
 Informal support: Informal support refer to informal training that students do in order to
learn, it may be physical or social.
 Independent study: Independent study gives individual his own choice to study or to
perform practices. It is essential for learning process of students.
 Working experience: Working experience is important as it provide motivation to
people regarding their work.