Case Study Help!!!!

[lna2rn]

I was assigned to do a case study on any patient I had in clinical. Unfortunately/fortunately I attended the NSNA mid-year conference and had not had a patient. I explained this to my instructor and she said she would take it into consideration when she graded the paper. She did not ( actually said if she had known we were doing this she would have given us an extension!). I lost 10 points because she said it was too medical. However ALL my research came directly from nursing journals.

I obviously don't have a clue to what she is asking me here so I was hoping to get your opinion. What is the fromat for a nursing focused case study? Any advice would be much appreciated.

[augigi, CNS]

Nursing problems and interventions rather than medical diagnoses and treatments, usually.

[lna2rn]

Thank You augigi! That is not very hard to do. I did include these items however maybe they were not thorough enough.

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

When you do a case study on a non-existent patient, what you have to do is work with the symptoms provided by the medical diagnosis(es). So, what you need to do is take the list of medical diagnoses and list out the signs and symptoms. You use those signs and symptoms as your assessment data to work up a care plan for this "patient". Those signs and symptoms then become the "defining characteristics" of the nursing diagnoses that you will use. Expand on them a bit and think of how they will affect the person's ability to perform their daily ADLs. You will have to do a little analysis and knowledge of the medical conditions to develop the "related factors" for your diagnostic statements. Once you have used that information to develop nursing diagnoses, it is relatively easy to finish the care plan off with outcomes and nursing interventions. Remember that as a nursing student your instructors are going to look to see that you are utilizing the nursing process. That is most likely what they are looking for in this assignment. A care plan is merely the written evidence of the nursing process.

As an example, let's say you chose otitis media. The signs and symptoms are

• severe pain
  
• symptoms of URI (sneezing, coughing)
  
• fever
  
• dizziness
  
• nausea/vomiting
  
• purulent draining from the ear

From those symptoms I can develop the following nursing diagnostic statements:

• Nausea R/T dizziness AEB patient verbalizing they feel they are going to vomit
  
• Hyperthermia R/T inflammatory process in the inner ear AEB fevers of 102 to 104 degrees F.
  
• Acute Pain R/T infectious disease process AEB patient complaints of throbbing pain in both ears
  
• Risk for Injury R/T difficulty maintaining balance when walking

From these I can develop nursing interventions for a patients feelings they are going to vomit, elevated temperature, the throbbing pain in the ears and problems with maintaining balance when walking.

Got the idea?

[lna2rn]

I want ot thank both of you. After reading the posts it clarified EVERYTHING. I did get a 90 on the paper so I am happy with the grade. I am now better equipped to write these nursing focused papers for when I enter a BSN program. I explained to my clinical instructor that I now understood what I did wrong. I can include treatment strategies as long as I include interventions to accompany them. She was very pleased that I took the initiative to figure out my problem and I couldn't have done it without you. Thanks:monkeydance:

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

good for you! i meant to post these two web sites that have sample case studies that you could look at, but i got busy and forgot all about it.

http://learn.sdstate.edu/craigg/ercases.html

http://learn.sdstate.edu/craigg/ersp01.html