Nursing Case Study: Communication, Ethics, and Conflict Resolution

This case study analyzes a nursing scenario involving Julia Fitzsimmons, focusing on communication strategies, ethical considerations, and conflict resolution within a healthcare setting. The assignment addresses communication principles with family members, self-awareness, and the open disclosure process. It examines ethical and regulatory responsibilities when using online services and social media, including organizational support for employees. The study explores communication breakdown between family members, factors inhibiting communication, and strategies for addressing conflicts, including conflict resolution principles. It also covers documentation, reporting, and resources for grief support. The case study identifies appropriate members of a case management team, their roles, and meeting procedures. It discusses strategies for managing group dynamics and the principles of open disclosure. The assignment concludes by highlighting the benefits of debriefing sessions for staff and outlining the topics covered in such sessions. The document is a past assignment available on Desklib, a platform that provides students with AI-powered study tools.

Running head: CASE STUDY
Nursing Case Study of Julia Fitzsimmons
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

1CASE STUDY
Q1)
A) Describe the principles, process and resources required to communicate with all members
if the family.
Answer:
Thus, the principles, and resources required for proper processes and treatment of the
patient are (Loghmani, Borhani, & Abbaszadeh, 2014):
 Contact details of the patient.
 Understanding and resonating along with the person presently taking care of the
patient
 Participation to provide support decision making for the individual on whom the
patient relies on.
 Identifying and staging the cause for which the patient requires treatment.
B) List minimum of three areas of self-awareness, which could affect your communication
with all members of the family.
Answer:
The areas of self-awareness affecting communication with family are
(pdfs.semanticscholar.org, 2020):
 Making up proper interpersonal relation with the family of the patient
 Use of proper resonating skills, i.e. skill of listening to the patient as well as their
family member.
 Use of proper skills of briefing the situation and interventions to be taken.
Q2) Describe show you would use the Open Disclosure process in this scenario.

2CASE STUDY
Answer:
Open Disclosure Skills for the respective scenario (cec.health.nsw.gov.au, 2020):
 Making the patient understand her situation and what interventions are being taken to
progress her cure.
 Letting them know their rights and what quality treatment is going to be provided to
them.
 The prescribed need for the course of care will be allocated to them and the timely
process for the care that will be provided to them.
Q3) Discuss the ethical and regulatory responsibilities when using online services and social
media in relation to this scenario.
Answer:
Regulatory guidelines during usage of online media services and social media for the
case are (ANMF Guidelines, 2020):
 During posting the case on personal behalf as experience, the nurse should not be
using the exact name or caste or race of the patient they dealt with.
 Pictures and names of the patient must be avoided if the documentation of the case is
being shared for help towards another such case, that too within the concerned policy
of the institution they are working with.
 The nurse must understand maintaining barriers with personal and professional life by
taking consent of the patient and their family member while taking pictures during
working with such.
Q4) Describe the process an organization would have in place to manage and support
employees engaging in social media.

3CASE STUDY
Answer:
Organizational support for the employees to engage in social media are (anf.org.au,
2020):
 Letting health care professionals upload the case as an experience in their resume, by
using an anonymous name for the patient.
 Allowing nurses to help their fellow practitioners residing at several parts of the world
by sharing their experiences over the online media.
Q5) Describe three signs assisting you to recognize the communication between BOB and
JASON is deteriorating and has the potential of becoming complicated and difficult?
Answer:
Three signs, which helped in recognizing the deteriorating communication between
Bob and Jason, are:
 Bob was not happy with Julia’s decision of staying with Jason who is more than twice
her age.
 At certain point, it was also evident that Jason is too much aggressive and takes
irrelevant decisions.
 Jason felt that Julia’s parents had been the barrier towards their relation and hence
barred Julia several times from talking to her parents.
Q6) List four factors likely to inhibit communication in this scenario.
Answer:
Four probable factors to inhibit communication, in this case, could be:

4CASE STUDY
 Since Julia used to stay with Jason thus Jason was more aware about Julia’s situation.
So he would have asked for the position of concerned family member who can look
after and stay with her.
 Being the father Bob can demand the same.
 Sonia’s concern to provide better intervention.
 Non-supportive approach towards interpersonal interaction for care due to conflict
within family.
Q7) Describe the strategies and resources (including health care personnel) you could use to
address this situation within your scope of practice and in line with relevant policies and
procedures.
Answer:
The scope of nursing practice is characterized as a variety of roles, duties,
commitments, and activities that are educated and approved to perform by registered nurses.
The policies applicable in this case are (arnnl.ca, 2020):
 Use of nursing theory to identify and coordinate procedure and nursing processes to
evaluate treat, schedule, execute, analyze and record client care thoroughly.
 Adopting a holistic view of treatment that meets the clients ' biological, mental,
economic, and spiritual health. This is done since the patient’s state is too critical and
each method can show minimum approach towards the care.
Q8) Describe the basic principles of conflict resolution and describe how you would use them
in this situation.
Answer:

5CASE STUDY
Basic principles of conflict resolution applicable for the following case are
(amanet.org. 2020):
 Understanding the rise of conflict
 Understanding the incident
 Planning solutions for the cause.
 Identifying the disputants
 Making the disputants agree on a proper agreement.
Q9) Documentation and reporting
Where and to whom would you document and report the communication strategies used and
outcomes such as this.
Answer:
Documentation and reporting for this case should be done to the partner (Jason) of
Julia Fitzsimmons should be done when the term comes for informing a family member, as
she is above 18 and decided to live with him. On the other hand, as a professional inside the
medical care unit the nurse should be reporting to the physician who had been appointed for
Julia’s treatment.
Q10) Identify and describe the resources you could utilize to assist people such as shirley in
relation to their grief.
Answer:
The resources that can be provided to assist individuals like Julia’s mother Shirley
are:
 Mental rehabilitation to cope up with the situation.

6CASE STUDY
 Making her understand that, living could be more suffering for Julia than leaving the
mortal realm.
 Providing her the reports showing the criticality of the situation.
 Asking her to show concern towards care for her daughter through palliative care.
Q11) Explain an justify why it is not appropriate for you to email result to Sonia in this
scenario.
Answer:
However, sister of Julia (Sonia) herself is a nurse but practicing 600 kms away from
the geographical location of Sonia. Information could have been shared to Sonia if she had
asked for it as a nurse taking care for the patient and not as a concerned family member.
Based on practicing of Sonia, she could have asked for other interventions rather than those,
which were chosen by the registered nurse taking care for Julia. The decisions could have
provided an alteration in state of mind. The situation states that if Sonia seeks for such
concern it would have happened that a nurse standing at a position of 600 kms away is acting
as the health care professional for a patient without having a physical contact with the patient,
which is ethically inevitable. Such concerns as a nurse might seek for palliative care for a
quality life for the patient but a family member will always seek for care to keep her alive in
such situation with all possible interventions rather moving to palliative care. Hence, it is
preferred not to share reports with Sonia.
Q12) Identify who would be appropriate members of this Case Management Team, describe
their role and explain what they would contribute to the meeting.
Answer:
Appropriate members of this case management team with their concerned roles will
be:

7CASE STUDY
 Jason (Julia’s partner): Since he has witnessed the pain and the methods undertaken
for Julia’s cure.
 The head registered nurse taking care of Julia: Since she managed the care for Julia
and planned to provide her intervention with possible quality of life through holistic
care approach.
 The physician operating her surgeries and providing the medications: Since he/she got
the proper knowledge of Julia’s case that what severity was her state was and what
possible interventions could be undertaken and the timeline for the same.
Q13) Identify and discuss the appropriate procedures to follow during this meeting.
Answer:
Procedures to be followed up during this meeting:
 Asking for the views of the concerned family members of Julia.
 Staging at different state of metastasis and analysis.
 Conducting debriefing sessions.
 Asking for the daily reports of the patients
 Analyzing the interventions used.
 Checking the dosage given to the patient and its side effects.
 Analyzing side effects are the cause for the cardiac arrest.
 Evaluating more possible and better interventions.
Q14) Describe two strategies you could use to manage group dynamics during meeting, when
conflict arises or to address competing personalities.
Answer:
The two possible strategies that a nurse can use to manage group dynamics are:

8CASE STUDY
 Keeping patience and hearing to the briefing process keenly with proper
understanding.
 Providing only needed and necessary left out points when needed.
Q15) Explain the principles, processes and practices of open disclosure in relation to this
incident.
Answer:
The open disclosure process promotes effective mediation for patients, supporting
individuals and concerned health care professionals. Open disclosure is a system to ensure
that during a patient safety event, open, truthful, empathic and adequate discussions take
place between patients and health-care personnel. Increased open transparency increases
patient, staff and community faith in how the organization relates to incidents involving
patient safety and is necessary for preserving or restoring confidence between health care
workers and patients.
Q16)
A) Describe the benefits of holding a debriefing session for staff.
Answer:
The debriefing must be the method for improving care for patients, empowering staff
and helping to create a better grasp of collaboration and comradery. Thus, a debriefing
session benefits by providing an open chance to the professionals working with a particular
case to arise query and understanding (cec.health.nsw.gov.au, 2020).
B) Outline what would be covered in the briefing session.
Answer:

9CASE STUDY
The themes covered under debriefing session are (cec.health.nsw.gov.au, 2020):
 Analyze the physical and emotional effects on all associated members
 Providing support to minimize staff loneliness
 Cope with stress at an initial stage
 Strengthen team spirit
 Reduce seclusion at a time when workforce may want to detach from social
interaction
 Reduce negative responses or health effects over time.

10CASE STUDY
Reference
cec.health.nsw.gov.au. (2020). Clinical Excellence Commission - Open Disclosure. Retrieved
15 January 2020, from http://www.cec.health.nsw.gov.au/incident-management/open-
disclosure
Loghmani, L., Borhani, F., & Abbaszadeh, A. (2014). Factors affecting the nurse-patients'
family communication in intensive care unit of kerman: a qualitative study. Journal of
caring sciences, 3(1), 67–82. doi:10.5681/jcs.2014.008
ANMF Guidelines. (2020). Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation. Retrieved 16
January 2020, from
http://anf.org.au/documents/policies/G_Use_of_Social_Media_and_Online_Networking.pdf
arnnl.ca. (2020). Retrieved 15 January 2020, from
https://www.arnnl.ca/sites/default/files/RD_Scope_of_Nursing_Practice.pdf
pdfs.semanticscholar.org. (2020). Retrieved 16 January 2020, from
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/90a4/9a9eae2c95a1c86de7aa1b1adc64b770af14.pdf
cec.health.nsw.gov.au. (2020). Retrieved 16 January 2020, from
http://www.cec.health.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0017/259010/support_for_staff.pdf
amanet.org. (2020). Retrieved 16 January 2020, from https://www.amanet.org/articles/the-five-
steps-to-conflict-resolution/
1.