Critical Thinking in Nursing Essay

This essay introduces nurses to different approaches in the development of professional approaches in the development of professional practice. However, critical thinking, reflection, and analysis have the same components in common and different ways of acquiring knowledge and skills necessary for clients. Critical thinking and learning are connected to lifelong processes. We need to be more aware of our skills and thinking when we choose our path of career. Experience makes a person skilled and helps to broaden their ability to make judgments. One important aspect of critical thinking is reflection.

For us (student nurses), critical thinking begins when the students seriously question and in a continuing way try to answer again and again.

When nurses direct critical thinking toward understanding and aiding patients to find the answer to their health issues, the method becomes purposeful and goal-orientated.

Through critical thinking, a person addresses problems, considers choices, and chooses an appropriate course of action.

It is clear that critical thinking needs not solely psychological features and mental process skills but a person’s habit of raising questions, to stay well familiar, being honest in

facing personal biases, and not be always willing to reconsider and think clearly about issue. (Alfaro-LeFevre 1999). Nurses who are good critical thinkers face problems without forming a quick, single solution and instead focus on the options of what to believe and do. This requires discipline to avoid premature decision-making.

Learning to think critically helps a nurse nurture clients as their advocate and form higher informed selections regarding their care.

Critical thinking is over simple resolution issues, it's an effort to continually improve.

Nurses learn to focus on preventing problems and maximizing a client's potential. Critical thinkers learn from each clinical experience and pursue each new opportunity with an openness and renewed purpose to excel in practice.

An important facet of critical thinking is the use of language.

Thinking and language are closely related processes.

The ability to use language is closely related to the flexibility to suppose meaningfully.

To become a critical thinker, a nurse must be able to use language precisely and clearly.

When language is imprecise or inaccurate it reflects similar thinking.

As nurses look after clients it becomes necessary not solely to speak clearly with clients and families but additionally to be ready to clearly communicate findings to different health professionals.

When a nurse uses incorrect words, jargon, or imprecise descriptions, communication is ineffective.

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Critical thinking needs a framing of one’s thoughts so the main focus and resultant message are clear.

It is useful to mirror your language and take into account whether or not what you communicate expresses a thought, position, or judgment precisely and clearly.

For a nurse, reflection involves thinking back on a client's situation or experience to explore the information and other factors that influenced the handling of the situation.

Reflection needs adequate information and is critical for self-evaluation, to review one’s successes and mistakes.

The process of reflection helps nurses request and perceive the relationships between ideas learned within the room and real-life clinical incidents.

Reflection additionally helps the nurse choose personal performance and build judgments regarding standards of observation.

It is a process that helps make sense out of an experience and facilitates the incorporation of the experience into the nurse’s view of themselves as a professional (Rolfe, Freshwater & Jasper 2002). Engaging in reflection is very individualized. Not everyone reflects in the same way.

Some folks build mental footage of {the information|the information|the data} they contemplate; some like quiet thought whereas others might choose to replicate new knowledge by discussing it with others.

Learning to be reflective takes practice.

A nurse World Health Organization chooses to reflect on clinical expertise should be hospitable to new data and be ready to verify the client’s perspective similarly to their own.

Reflecting on experience reveals behavior important to the nurse’s skilled development.

Through reflection, the nurse recognizes that the actions were either self-made or unsuccessful.

The next time an identical expertise arises, the nurse uses approaches that were successful or revise an approach to ensure a successful outcome (Crisp & Taylor 2005).

Moreover, the reflective process also needs honesty, trust, time commitment, motivation, and practice. Kinsella (2001) argues that action without reflection leads to meaningless activism, while reflection without action means we are not bringing our awareness into the world. Her preference is for a balance of action and reflection. Many authors recognize the need to consider the contexts in which we practice and to understand that the “good intentions” (Townsend, 1998) of health professionals can be overruled by practice contexts and resource limitations that don’t facilitate or allow optimal practice. Reflecting on these issues can be challenging as decisions need to be made about what one can and cannot tolerate. It may promote professionals to become advocates for their clients or to challenge the systems and practice contexts in which they work. Considering the consequences of challenges is an important part of reflection prior to action. There are two types of reflections involved, these are reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action. Reflection-in-action is the reflection that takes place whilst you are involved in the situation, often a patient interaction. Reflection-in-action involves using analysis of observation, listening, and/or touch or ‘feel’ to problem solve. It therefore sounds a lot like clinical reasoning – where reflection differs is that the problem-solving leads to a change in the practitioner’s view of self, values, and beliefs. Because it is happening on the spot, this type of reflection often appears very intuitive. It can take some time to develop the skills of reflection-in-action – it often is a skill associated with the development of expert practice. Reflection-on-action type of reflection involves stepping back from the situation, meaning that it happens at some time after the situation has occurred.

Therefore it demands a time commitment – one thing that's typically a challenge.

Despite this, it has an important place in professional development.