The Importance Of Reflective Thinking In Nursing Practice

The term reflection means the examination of personal thoughts and actions. For nurses this means focusing on how they interact with their colleagues and with the environment to obtain a clearer picture of their own behaviour. This means it is a process in which a nurse can better understand themselves in order to be able to build on existing strengths and take appropriate future action (Somerville, 2004). Reflection is a way to bring your own intuition along with empirical knowledge together. Reflective practice in nursing is guided by models of reflection. Reflective practice model serves as a framework within which nursing or other management professions can work. Reflective practice model is also a structural framework or learning model that serves the purposes of a profession and is particularly applicable to health related professions. Reflective practice enables practitioners to learn to value themselves as significant people with values and feelings that are important factors in giving care. Whilst reflective practice allows the nurse to recognise the value of their experiences, they may also need support to work through a difficult situation. This is where reflection aids nurses in dealing with these challenging experiences (Johns, 1995). Reflection on experience offers nurses the opportunity to reflect on caring in practice in ways that its nature can be understood, where the skills necessary for effective caring can be developed and most significantly, where the values of caring for people can be highlighted, both to the individual nurse and the world in general (Johns 1996)

Reflecting upon a career in nursing allows an individual to draw upon past experiences. A nurse can think about what motivated them when they first started their career and compare it to their motivations today. It offers insight as to which of the nursing code of ethics correlate to their individual nursing practice. Reflection also allows a nurse to see their progression towards their goals, or if any have changed throughout their career. When used everyday, reflection can improve our practice and allow us to transcend as care providers.

In reflection in action, expert professionals examine their experiences and responses as they occur and adapt t...

Reflection has its importance in clinical practice; we always seek to be successful and that can be achieved by learning every day of our life through experiences we encounter. In that way we can reconsider and rethink our previous knowledge and add new learning to our knowledge base so as to inform our practice. Learning new skills does not stop upon qualifying; this should become second nature to thinking professionals as they continue their professional development throughout their careers (Jasper, 2006). According to Rolfe et al. (2001), reflection does not merely add to our knowledge, it also challenges the concepts and theories by which we try to make sense of that knowledge. Acquiring knowledge through reflection is modern way of learning from practice that can be traced back at least to the 1930s and the work of John Dewey, an American philosopher and educator who was the instigator of what might be called ''discovery learning'' or learning from experience. He claimed that we learn by doing and that appreciating what results from what we do leads to a process of developing knowledge, the nature and importance of which then we must seek to interpret (Rolfe et al., 2001).

The position statement in paper 2 has an introduction and conclusion, as well as have used a large amount of evidence in the context to demonstrate the contribution of reflective practice in the health care setting. This essay has used credible and relevant references on most occasions. Nevertheless, it is not well structured. The author does not provide a clear plan for this position statement in the introduction, the context is lack of argument, and there are new information presented in the conclusion. The author does utilise several evidences from journal articles and NMBA, and yet have insufficient consideration of alternative views. Furthermore, some sentences in the context are not coherent and logical.

Bulman, C and Schutz, S. (2004). Reflective Practice in Nursing. Australia: Blackwell (3 ed). pp.29.

The ability to become reflective in practice has become a necessary skill for health professionals. This is to ensure that health professionals are continuing with their daily learning and improving their practice. Reflective practice plays a big part in healthcare today and is becoming increasingly noticed.

Burns, S. Bulman, C. Palmer, A. (1997) Reflective Practice in Nursing - The growth of the professional practitioner. London: Blackwell Science.

A key technique current and nurses in learning can use is reflection based on past experiences. This method of critical thinking enables the user to have an approach of systematic analysis for present and future scenarios with the intent of improvement. In terms of knowing, reflection has appeared to be a crucial part of learning and understanding. (Bonis, 2009).

Middleton, J. (2004). A Practical To Promote Reflective Practice Within Nursing .Retrieved March 31, 2004 from www.nursingtimes.net.