Managing Expectations

[Anna Flaxis, BSN, RN]

In the time I've been away from acute care, I've had the opportunity to reflect on the factors that contributed to the role stress that drove me away. One of the most significant contributing factors to my role stress was not knowing how to manage expectations (i.e. the expectations of patients and their loved ones, other nurses, ancillary staff, physicians, etc.).

What are some of your tips for managing expectations?

[LadyFree28, BSN, LPN, RN]

The approach that bests benefits me is using SBAR on myself, the healthcare team, and the patient/family. Having a plan. Once I have report, I give report or general info with the tech or caregiver I am working with. I give a quick summation to my patients what I am able to do, what are their needs, and let them know what is possible during our time together, and what we "can work on". I seek out peers who are in the same area, making sure we can look out on our patients, and with caregivers as well, so we can collaborate and make sure if our efforts are somewhat coordinated.

I find having this approach provides more collaboration, less stress, and still gives excellent quality of care, and a realistic approach on what can be done in that time period, and identify if there are other team members that need to be involved i.e., social work, psych, PT/OT/SLP if needed or changes need to be updated. Nursing is 24/7, approaching on how to maximize the quality time for patients, allows for clustering care, rounding and making ways to address issues during the time period as much as possible (because it will NOT always happen) and being OK with that, makes a huge difference.