NR-103 Week 5 RUA: Transforming a Novice Nurse to an Expert

Transforming a Novice Nurse to an Expert Chamberlain University College of Nursing NR103: Transition to the Nursing Profession Transforming a Novice Nurse to an Expert One of the scariest experiences after any job training is utilizing what you learned during training in practice. It is even scarier as a nurse because your mistakes can potentially cause harm to you or someone else. A novice nurse has many resources that he or she needs to rely on to make sure they can provide safe and efficient care, including both personal and system support. A novice nurse becomes an expert nurse once he or she has a full comprehension of the complete situation surrounding patient care (Matter & Wolgast, 2020). Summary of Article It is imperative that a nurse in his or her beginning stages rely heavily on their personal support and learn how to effectively utilize their system support. Personal support consists of support from peers, such as mentors and other team members, as well as the type of orientation and length of the orientation. System support consist of efficiency processes, such as electronic medical records, smart pumps, and a systems approach of providing care. Because nursing efficiency is connected to the financial health of any health care organization it is vital that a novice nurse progress to a competent nurse as quickly as possible. As a novice nurse, an adequately trained preceptor is critical for your transition from a student to an advanced beginner nurse. Many new nurses lack good time management and prioritization skills and precepting helps them develop these skills by allowing them to learn from their preceptors. A supportive setting is crucial for the advancement of a novice nurse and a good preceptor will be able to successfully pass along his or her skills and strategies to a novice nurse. Nurse residency programs and mentorship are also other methods to help advance an inexperienced nurse to the next stages of competency. The medical field is constantly advancing with new technology and methods of teamwork to increase efficiency, these are the system support a novice nurse needs to learn to utilize to be proficient. Teamwork is instrumental to creating efficiency in health care systems (Matter & Wolgast, 2020, pg 44). A nurse’s workload is usually heavy and having a dependable competent team alleviates some of the stress of load. Also, multidisciplinary rounds, if planned well, is a system support that can increase proficiency. Updated and new technology, such as portable communication tools, call systems, smart pumps, and electronic medical records can both hinder and increase efficiency. Learning new electronics while remaining at the same level of productivity can cause frustrations which in turn have the adverse effect of causing inefficiency. System support might look as if it is slowing you down at first, but once you understand how to use it you will see it increases proficiency and helps you to be a better more efficient team member. Conclusion Everyone starts as a novice nurse but with proper personal and systems support, as well as individual development, becoming a competent registered nurse is attainable. Using the tools and methods described above a novice nurse should be able to grow and perform their skills at a high level of efficiency in a reasonable amount of time. A good leader and team are essential to the development of a new nurse, and once the novice nurse becomes an expert they can continue the cycle and support a new novice nurse in his or her journey to becoming an expert nurse. Reflection As a nursing student I have already learned that having a good leader and team is essential for success. I have been out of college over ten years and now being enrolled as a new student again it is sometimes stressful trying to balance work, school, and a social life. I have already reached out to classmates to help keep me on the path to success. Just like being new to school I know once I begin my nursing career I will have to lean on my leader and team. Two major factors in determining your success as a nurse are your ability to consistently learn and how good you are at working in a team setting. References Matter, S. & Wolgast, K.A. (2020). Making good use of your limited time: Supporting novice nurses. Nursing Clinics of North America, 55(1), 39-49.