Help with prioritizing nursing diagnoses?

[laurim45]

Hello everyone this is my first discussion/thread i'm posting! I'm a second semester nursing student and I wanted some insight on a patient scenario that I'm having trouble prioritizing in terms of nursing diagnoses.

This patient has a right knee pain; osetoporois; s/p arthocentesis with purulent fluid; contact isolation MRSA; E-coli

I know this patient will definitely have some sort of impaired physical mobility but i'm not sure if this will be the priority?

I'm still learning how to critically think in terms of what's highest priority so I'm trying to sort everything out. Any insight would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[amoLucia]

Think - what would most likely kill him first? I'm thinking the infections.

The immobility would most surely take a much longer time (assuming NO life threatening incident occurs). It is true that the immobility might be the pt's biggest issue (to him), but then he might be soooo sick with the infection that he doesn't care if he gets OOB or not post-op.

The immobility would be a STRONG #2 for real problems and 'risk for'.

JMO

[gypsierose]

The infection is the priority. NANDA seems to only have "Risk for Infection" as an option, and some instructors don't want a "risk for" to ever be a priority Dx, but that is where NANDA sort of fails us, and my one sensible instructor allows "Infection" as a Nursing Dx whereas other instructors don't agree so ask your instructor? Feeling your pain (second year and can't wait to be done!)