Assignment task:
Shanille is a new RN graduate working on an active medical teaching unit. She had recently been caring for a patient who had challenged her sense of "good" care. The patient, Mary Simpson, was a 24-year-old woman who was being investigated for recurrent gastrointestinal pain. She had been undergoing numerous tests to rule out a variety of diagnoses, including bowel cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, ovarian cysts, and pelvic inflammatory disease. She is very fearful and anxious.
Shanille is concerned because she is unfamiliar with the medications the patient is taking to control pain and symptoms, and it is taking her a great deal of time to look them up and check on interactions. She feels she should be spending more time talking to Mary about her fears, because it was quite possible the reason for her anxiety symptoms becoming worse.
However, Shanille also feels that she must be sure about what she is administering to her patient. She wonders if she could just give the meds without looking them up, and really questions how she could better set priorities to make sure that she attends to all the patient's needs.
1. Choose ONE CNA value that can be applied to this scenario. Justify your answer.
2. Choose ONE CNO principle that can be applied to this scenario. Justify your answer.
3. As the RN, what should you do when you have competing priorities?