Nursing Care Report: Person-Centered Approach and Aging Theories

This report provides a comprehensive overview of nursing care, emphasizing a patient-centered approach and the application of aging theories. It begins by highlighting the importance of person-centered care, which considers individual values, desires, and circumstances to develop appropriate solutions. The report then explores the development of biological, social, and psychological theories of aging and their use in guiding holistic nursing practice. The application of Maslow's motivational theory is discussed, emphasizing the nurse's role in addressing the emotional needs of older adults. The report also addresses the rights and responsibilities of older persons, the role of enrolled nurses, and the Aged Care Act. Advance Care Directives and accreditation quality standards are also covered, along with the management of restraints in aged care settings. The report references relevant literature and legislation to support the discussed concepts.

Running Head: NURSING CARE
NURSING CARE
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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1. As a nurse there is a need that I can provide a patient centered approach to all the
patients. Person-centred care is not about providing the individuals with their choice of
treatment or information but it also considers the values, desires, family situations, lifestyle,
and circumstances that will help the individual along with the nurses to develop the
appropriate solution (Gilligan and Weinstein 2014). The nurses can get the information for
having the holistic approach by the past medical history as well as the patient details. The
benefit of having such an approach is that the patient and the nurse both are comfortable with
each other as well as the nurse can provide the patient with the required amount of care and
treatment. The development of biologic, social, and psychological theories of ageing attempts
to understand, explain and explore the various dimensions of ageing. These theories of ageing
are used as a guide to develop a holistic nursing theory for practice application when caring
for the elderly. The application of the Maslow’s motivational theory can be linked to the
process of aging. The nurses can link the need of love and belongingness to the treatment of
the adults. Maslow says that the adults who are staying alone or away from their children try
to overcome loneliness and alienation emotions. This includes providing love, affection and
feeling of belonging as well as getting it. Here it is the duty of the nurse to identify such
emotional crisis in the older population and to provide them with care and assurance (Kaur
2013).
2. a) The rights and responsibilities of older persons do not diminish with age, and
they can enjoy the same rights to freedom, respect and to be treated fairly, regardless of their
physical and mental capacities to use their rights. Enrolled nurses can support the older
persons through demonstrated knowledge and skills nursing care, and facilitate them in
exercising their autonomy, their lifestyle, and respecting their choices (McManus et al. 2015).
Every year, the elderly experience violations of human rights, ranging from discrimination
and social and political exclusion, abuse in nursing facilities, negligence in humanitarian

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environments, and rejection and rationing of the healthcare. Healthcare services should strive
at maintaining integrity and autonomy and minimizing patient distress. The literature
indicates that in healthcare environments, both the dignity and autonomy of the elderly are
often undermined (Gilligan and Weinstein, 2014). Dignity is questioned mainly by adverse
interactions between employees and patients, a lack of respect for the privacy of patients, and
a common insensitivity to an elderly population's requirements and wishes. If patients are not
offered appropriate data or the chance to fully comprehend their diagnosis and make
informed decisions about their care, autonomy is endangered. In specific, older individuals
are readily disabled in healthcare environments (Hepburn et al. 2015).
b) The Aged Care Act establishes the principles relating to the environment, care and
management of elderly people, including funding, access and scope of aged care services,
Mandatory Reporting for abuse and neglect and supporting the rights to services of the
elderly people. The role of the enrolled nurse is to work with the patients as well as the other
healthcare professionals to provide the nursing care and also to promote safe working
environment in areas such as administering medication and behavioural management, health
emergency responses, and infection prevention and controls (Connolly et al. 2014). It is
important for the nurses and the allied professionals to have knowledge of the relevant acts as
then they will be able to educate the elderly about the services that are available which they
can avail in order to get better healthcare services. This can be helpful for the nurses’ to have
a patient centered approach towards the patients. This will also strengthen the bond between
the nurses and the patients along with improving the knowledge of the nurses. Apart from the
Aged Care Act, 1997 there are a number of other acts that are related to the aged care in
Australia (Kaine and Ravenswood 2013). These acts involve the Aged Care (Transitional
Provisions) Act 1997, Aged Care (Accommodation Payment Security) Act 2006, Aged Care

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(Accommodation Payment Security) Levy Act 2006, Australian Aged Care Quality Agency
Act 2013, and Australian Aged Care Quality Agency (Transitional Provisions) Act 2013.
c) Advance Care Directive (ACD) allows an individual to state his values, directions
and wishes that need to be considered before medical treatment decisions are made on his
behalf. In the ACD, the individual can specify treatments or procedures that he wants to
avoid, such as Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) and declining life support measure when death is
an imminent and inevitable outcome (Houben et al. 2014). The role of the enrolled nurse is to
find out if the patient has an ACD through patient records and respect the patient’s wishes
when in contact with the patient. It becomes active after the patient signs it after the clinician
diagnoses the patient with terminal disorder or when two doctors find the patient in an
unconscious state. There are a number of reasons for the fail of the ACD. The important
reason is the focus of the healthcare staff on the treatment and not on the values and wishes of
the patients that compels the doctors to forget about the ACD (Bismark et al. 2015).
d) All providers of aged care organisation are required to meet Accreditation quality
standards to ensure that all residents live in safe and comfortable environment. The
accreditation standards cover areas such as management, staffing, health and personal care,
residential lifestyle, living environment, catering, cleaning, continuous improvement, safety
and security (Hasse 2013). As an enrolled nurse, I would work under the supervision of RN
to provide residents with basic nursing care in accordance with the care plan, including
wound dressings, medication administration and an incident of resident fall to ensure that
residents receive a safe and quality care. I would seek for assistance from RN or other team
members if tasks fall outside of my ability or area of responsibility. I would inform the RN
and accurately document information about change in the conditions and the outcomes of
delegated care (Toomey et al. 2016). For care home employees, quality indicators and a
quality surveillance system created for use in the legislative study process provide a tool for

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quality improvement. The systematic use of resident evaluation information can help identify
quality of care issues and determine the nature of those issues. This is called the ResCare QA
or the Residential Care Quality Assessment. The risk classification system measures the risk
that is associated with the care of the aged individuals who are being admitted in the hospital.
It falls under the aged care act and has to be followed by the nurses while taking care of the
adults (Gilligan and Weinstein 2014). The risk classification system is used to identify the
risk for the utilization of the healthcare services.
3. Restraint is the restriction of an individual’s movement or freedom, using any type
of equipment, drug or a psychological activity. State and territory governments have
established guidelines to limit the use of restraints only to maintain patient safety. In an aged
care setting, if the restraint is used outside of the scope defined in the guidelines, the nurse
would have breached the law and his/her practice would be deemed to fail to uphold the
professional standards of nursing practice, which would have consequences with AHPRA
(Bismark et al. 2015). The nurses try to give the patients a restraint free environment while
providing them quality care and treatment. The healthcare professionals can order the
application of such restraints along with the nurses who has the responsibility of applying the
restraints safely. There are a large number of laws that protect the rights of the elderly
residing in the residential care. The civil laws that protect the aged care if the treatment falls
below the prescribed standard involves the Elder Justice Act. The Act will help the care staff
to take all the responsibility to provide the appropriate care.

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References
Bismark, M.M., Fletcher, M., Spittal, M.J. and Studdert, D.M., 2015. A step towards
evidence-based regulation of health practitioners. Australian Health Review, 39(4), pp.483-
485.
Connolly, M.J., Broad, J.B., Boyd, M., Kerse, N. and Gott, M., 2014. Residential aged care:
The de facto hospice for N ew Z ealand's older people. Australasian journal on ageing, 33(2),
pp.114-120.
Gilligan, J. and Weinstein, B.E., 2014. Health literacy and patient-centered care in audiology
—Implications for adult aural rehabilitation. The Journal of Communication Disorders, Deaf
Studies & Hearing Aids, 2, p.110.
Hasse, G.L., 2013. Patient-centered care in adult trauma intensive care unit. Journal of trauma
nursing, 20(3), pp.163-165.
Hepburn, C.M., Cohen, E., Bhawra, J., Weiser, N., Hayeems, R.Z. and Guttmann, A., 2015.
Health system strategies supporting transition to adult care. Archives of disease in
childhood, 100(6), pp.559-564.
Houben, C.H., Spruit, M.A., Groenen, M.T., Wouters, E.F. and Janssen, D.J., 2014. Efficacy
of advance care planning: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of the American
Medical Directors Association, 15(7), pp.477-489.
Kaine, S.J. and Ravenswood, K., 2013. Working in residential aged care: A trans-Tasman
comparison. New Zealand Journal of Employment Relations.
Kaur, A., 2013. Maslow’s need hierarchy theory: Applications and criticisms. Global Journal
of Management and Business Studies, 3(10), pp.1061-1064.

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McManus, M., White, P., Barbour, A., Downing, B., Hawkins, K., Quion, N., Tuchman, L.,
Cooley, W.C. and McAllister, J.W., 2015. Pediatric to adult transition: a quality improvement
model for primary care. Journal of Adolescent Health, 56(1), pp.73-78.
Toomey, S.L., Elliott, M.N., Schwebel, D.C., Tortolero, S.R., Cuccaro, P.M., Davies, S.L.,
Kampalath, V. and Schuster, M.A., 2016. Relationship between adolescent report of patient-
centered care and of quality of primary care. Academic pediatrics, 16(8), pp.770-776.