care plan ?

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why do them in nursing school?

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Emergency, Trauma.

Care plans help prepare the student nurse to THINK like a nurse; in addition, care plans, or rather, a plan of care is used to manage patients in the health care setting; each is individualized to address the patient's needs.

The patient plan of care is also used to as evidence to manage reimbursement costs of healthcare needs for the individual patient as well.

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They help you identify a patient's nursing needs and prioritize care. They are annoying as hell but not as useless as popularly believed.

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As time consuming as they are, care plans teach you to think like a nurse.

As a CNA, I thought about tasks and getting them all done. Vitals first, then pass breakfast trays, etc.

As a nurse, after I get report, there needs to be a plan for the day beyond just tasks. Plans and goals for your patients matter. Someone has to wean them off that oxygen, optimize their pain control so they can increase mobility, what is the main problem to tackle first, etc. When the doctors round, the question is after presenting the facts: what is our plan for the day?

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There's a relevant need for care plans in home health where we actually perform methodical teaching plans with goals. (We have a great deal more time with teaching being a bulk of our skilled service.) Without a care plan no one would have any methodical way to meet a individual's learning needs to best manage their own health. We also include our tasks which require the same textbook care planning but it's also a way to help adhere to plan.

When new nurses have come to us not having a strong grasp of how to develop and utilize a care plan, it adversely affects their performance and patient care.

If you can, try to find a HH case mgr to help you with a real world perspective, then you can go back to your assignment and plug in all of the care planning verbiage. (That's assuming a need in understanding care planning, maybe you've already got it.)

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Erika: you have made several posts on multiple forums that leave me a bit confused. You asked about getting into nursing schools with a low GPA, which indicates you might be trying to become a nursing student...you also asked about NCLEX prep (which might indicate you are done with nursing school). And this question, which SHOULD indicate you are already going to nursing school, I think, but have not gotten to this part yet?

If we know your status, maybe we can help tailor the answers to best help you.

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