concept mapping book by Schuster

i have a copy of concept mapping: a critical -thinking approach to care planning by pamela mchugh schuster. it costs $25.95 and is a 173 page paperback. this book was basically written for her students and is an instruction manual on how to complete a concept map as a care plan. it has a number of forms within it for the students to use in doing this. she focuses a lot on assessments of various kinds with some forms for the students to use. there is a 5-page patient profile database form in the book. i also noticed a flow sheet with assessment information on it. she uses a scenario of a diabetic patient in showing how to go through the process of putting a concept map (care map) together and the final completed concept map is shown in the book. in the chapter on goals and interventions she gives information on teaching plans, discusses the method teaching plan and talks about how to prioritize problems.

i also have nursing care plans: nursing diagnosis and intervention, 6th edition, by meg gulanick and judith l. myers. it is a 1154 page paperback. this book was also written by the authors for their students. they tried to come up with the best of both a nursing care plan book and a nursing diagnosis reference book. the first part of the book is a nursing diagnosis reference that includes nanda taxonomy, but it only includes information for 62 diagnoses (there are currently 188 nursing diagnoses). supposedly, these are the most commonly used nursing diagnoses. each listing for a diagnosis includes the nanda definition + some discussion by the authors about the type of medical problems that might fit with that nursing diagnosis, the related factors (etiology), defining characteristics (symptoms), some expected outcomes, and then gives you a listing of potential nursing interventions and rationales broken down into the categories of ongoing assessment, therapeutic intervention, and education/continuity of care. interventions are also marked as being independent or collaborative. some of this nursing diagnosis information can be accessed for free online at http://www1.us.elsevierhealth.com/merlin/gulanick/constructor/index.cfm

the second part of the book is like a care plan book and organized into chapters by body systems with care plan information for major diseases only within those body systems. there is a short paragraph with some information about the disease and a little bit of the pathophysiology and then nursing diagnoses for that condition follow. under each nursing diagnosis is the nanda information first followed by the nursing interventions and rationales.

is there something specific you want to know about either book?

there is a sticky thread on allnurses that has weblinks to some sites that discuss care maps:

• https://allnurses.com/forums/f205/care-maps-225330.html - care maps (in nursing student assistance forum)
  

i really, really recommend that you learn the steps of the nursing process because that is the way a care plan is actually constructed. if you know that, it won't matter whether you write the care plan in the form of a concept map, a chart, an essay as in a case study, or a clinical pathway. a care plan is nothing more than the written documentation of your problem solving process. that process has 5 steps. if there is anything you learn in the time you spend in nursing school it needs to be how to solve patient problems using that nursing process because that is what you are going to be doing on the job as an rn. most of the time we think problems through. but for documentation purposes, we also have to know how to commit them to paper because it is required by federal law. that's all a care plan is. it's slow and difficult going to do one as a student because all the information is new to you. as you become more experienced as years go on, it will get easier to do them. nursing care planning made incredibly easy is a wonderful book. the nursing diagnosis part of it stinks and really has very little specific information to offer. i think it just proves a point that i am always trying to make that students and instructors put too much emphasis on nursing diagnoses where it doesn't belong. however, the rest of the book is pretty good.

i'm not sure i understand your question. the first part of the gulanick/myers book (the nursing diagnosis) part is to be used as a nursing diagnosis reference like any other reference book (dictionary or encyclopedia). the nursing diagnoses as they are used in care plan section have been specifically amended for the medical diagnostic problems they are addressing.

if you explore the weblinks in the sticky thread (care maps) you will find several examples of actual concept maps for care plans as well as a template for one. there is also a link to a website there that shows a completed nursing care map.

the steps of the nursing process will become clearer as you review it and work with it. here is a more practical application of it to something that occurs in our daily lives that might make more sense of it to you:

the nursing process is really not that foreign to us, just the same problem solving process we have always used, re-packaged and jazzed up with a few fancy labels and rules that we need to apply. assessment is a huge factor because it is from assessment that you discover the patient's symptoms. and, those symptoms become the foundation of everything that is done in the second and third steps of the nursing process. every step builds upon what happened in the step before it, so following the sequence is important. this is why having a care plan book is fine as a reference tool, but the major work comes from what you did and know about the patient. not every patient will have all the signs and symptoms of a disease. and, every patient brings with them other problems beside what is going on with the medical disease that you have to ferret out. you will note that many care plan books aren't always real good on adls, something that we nurses are suppose to assess for and assist patients with. hope that helps you.