What Is Reflective Reflection

The purpose of this essay is to describe reflection and various aspects of reflective practice. It will discuss the importance of reflective practice in healthcare. It concentrates on healthcare professionals and how they can improve their ability to reflect and what reflection helps them to achieve. It includes description of chosen models used for reflection. Gibbs (1988) reflective cycle will be used for critical incident analysis. Incident is related to gaining informed consent and will analyse student nurse experience from clinical placement environment. It aims to examine thoughts and feelings of the student, who participated in initial assessment of service user. The focus will be on communication, respect and dignity. It will compare

Their findings have implications for education of students and give some suggestion on how to improve professional development in inexperienced practitioners. One of them which need to be mentioned is time, because neither classrooms or clinical practice usually allow individuals to take time to reflect on their thoughts, feelings or behaviours. Glaze (2001) sees the importance of teaching reflection and highlights the student and their willingness to reflect as one of the factors to develop skill of reflection. Jasper (1999) supports the idea that reflection as a skill need to be learnt. Nurses use verbal refection, which is natural process however to grow professionally and personally they need to practice written reflection on top. Jack and Smith (2007) discuss developing of individuals’ self and promoting self-awareness to improve nursing practice. Self- awareness is a never-ending journey. (Eckroth-Bucher, 2010) Recommended way to encourage self- awareness is writing a reflective diary. This form of reflection enables better understanding of individuals’ competencies, limitations and feelings. It summarises the learning outcomes and promotes personal growth (Williams, Gerardi, Gill, Soucy, 2009). This shows the practical use of reflection and how it can influence individuals. Furthermore, it is crucial to know what skills are needed to help us to reflect. Reflective skills can be identified as generic skills or professional competencies independent on the context. There is a need of theoretical knowledge base and acquirement of practical experience. Students need to be able to think critically while they work, assess the situations with their possible outcomes and aim for continuous development. (Plack, Santasier, 2004; Hatlevik, 2012). They need to be able to make a link between what they know and how it can be successfully used in