chronic illness – stigma

In this paper you will select a nursing concept from the list provided below.

Caring

Comfort

Coping

Empathy

Empowerment and powerlessness

Hardiness and resilience

Dignity

Empathy

Facilitation

Fatigue

Recovery

Grief

Diversity

Humour

Loneliness

Shame

Suffering

Trust

Vulnerability

Body Image

Chronic Illness: Stigma

Life span issues of the nurse

Palliative care: children/ adolescents/ older adults

• You will apply the pertinent theoretical concepts to a clinical situation from your past or present nursing experience (not personal life experiences). This paper offers you the opportunity to analyze a practice issue in light of enhanced knowledge and personal awareness. The paper must follow APA format. Marks will be deducted for improper APA format.
• Should you wish to present on a topic not on the above list please consult with your instructor.
• Should there be any issues within the group membership it is an expectation that these issues will be brought to the attention of the course instructors and will be addressed with the members and course instructor.

The application paper should include:

1. an introduction to the scope of the paper and a conclusion that captures the essence of your discussion.
2. a description of the clinical situation to be analyzed.
3. the identification of the relevance of the topic/clinical situation to you both personally and professionally.
4. the identification, discussion, and analysis of 2 issues of the concept within the clinical situation.
5. discussion of how theory related to the concept (from the scholarly sources/ articles) facilitates your understanding/interpretation of issues/aspects of the clinical situation.
6. how your analysis of the clinical situation utilizing theory related to the concept will influence your future nursing practice.
7. conclusion/ summary
8. theoretical content that must be clearly related to the situation you are discussing
9. headings.

N.B. “Theory” identified in 6. does not refer to Nursing Theory or Theorists (e.g. Watson, Roy and their models). It refers to the scientific information contained in the scholarly readings – those in all readings listed with the class concept and/or any scholarly material related to the concept you have chosen.

Length of paper: 5-6 typewritten pages (excluding title page and reference pages).

Due date of paper: Week 9.

Provided below is a detailed explanation of the requirements of each of the above sections (# 1-9). Should you have any questions about your paper please be sure that you contact your instructor and ask your questions.

Detailed Requirements for Paper

The following provides you with a detailed explanation of the requirements for the paper. Consider this to be the recipe for success in the writing of your paper. I encourage you to print the details included below and follow them carefully as you construct your paper.

Step 1

You will need to select 1 concept from the list of concepts that are provided above. In consideration of your choice of concept you are encourage to think about one clinical situation you will be presenting/ exploring/ discussing in your paper and ensure that the two are compatible, if they are not

• consider exploring and presenting a different clinical situation.
  or
• consider exploring another concept that is relevant to the situation.

Step 2- Description of Clinical Situation

Write a description of the clinical situation that you are going to present in the paper. This description should not be more than 1/2 page in length. Within this description you should provide an overview of the situation so that the reader has a brief but clear understanding of what occurred in the situation.

Once you have done this, reflect on what you have written and make sure that your description includes the two issues that you are going to talk about latter so that your instructor can clearly see that they existed in the situation.

For example if your paper was about the concept of Music Therapy (note: this is not a concept being covered this year in this course) three issues that might be part of the clinical situation may be: 1) the client experienced a decrease in pain with the use of music therapy; 2) a sense of empowerment with the ability to choose his music and 3) the physiological impact on his blood pressure and pulse from his listening to music.

It is important to remember that sometimes a “concept” can become an issue in another concept. For example “stigma” maybe an issue in the concept of “body image” just as “powerlessness ” maybe an issue in chronic illness.

It is important that the two issues of the concept you are exploring are present in the paper. Remember, this is an application paper, you will be exploring the two issues of the concept through how they presented in the clinical situation not how they present in general within society.

Please note that a definition of a clinical situation for this paper is: the events of 1 client within 1 time frame. This means that you will be talking about 1 person’s experiences during 1 episode/ event of their life.

There are a few clinical situations that have been received in some papers in the past that were not acceptable clinical situations and thus this was reflected in the students’ grades. These included but were not limited to:

• presenting the clinical situation as being: a unit at work, a hospital, a country.
• rather than talking about 1 client presenting more then 1 client in the clinical situation.
• presenting a clinical situation that is not about a client you cared for: rather it is a family member’s experience.
• using yourself as a client in any of the topics not identified as being acceptable to do so.

Remember that this is an application paper you are exploring the concept through the lens of your experience as a nurse and your interactions with a client. This section should not be longer then 1 page in length.

Step 3- Relevance of topic/ situation to Me Personally and Professionally

This step is reflective in nature. We are asking you to reflect on and identify why you chose this concept/ clinical situation to talk about. There was something that stood out above all the other concepts/ experiences that you have had during your professional life and I am interested in hearing about this.

We are interested in hearing about the professional relevance. For example, how will this exploration allow you to grow professionally or what impact did the situation have on you professionally?

We are also interested in hearing how the situation impacted on you as a person. This section in your paper should be no longer than 1/2 page in length.

Step 4

You have previously identified your concept and the 2 issues of the 1 concept that you will be exploring, discussing and analyzing in the clinical situation. It is at this point I recommend that you carry out a review of the literature. Please do not use the words “I carried out research on the topic” in your paper, this is not a correct statement to make or to include in your paper. Should you wish, you could say “I reviewed the available literature on the topic”.

I suggest that you gather the articles that are relevant to the 1 concept and each of the two issues and make 2 piles: one pile of articles for each of the issues. As you go through each article in each pile take 2 colored highlighters and mark the content that is relevant to issue 1 (highlight in red) and the content that is relevant to issue 2 (highlight in blue). Once you have done this you have easy color-coded access to content that is relevant to each issue.

The articles that you use/ include in your paper should be within 5 published years unless they are seminal and then they can be older.

Step 5 – Identification, discussion and analysis of the two issues

During this step you will do the following:

1. with issue one, describe the issue as it presented in the clinical situation. This should be 1-1/2 pages in length.
2. with issue two repeat the above process- describe the issue as it presented in the clinical situation .This should be 1 page in length.

Once you have done this for each of the issues, go back to the one page documents and add the relevant theory/ content from the articles you have selected. It is important that the content that you include be relevant to the issue as it has been presented in the clinical situation. For example if the issue in your clinical situation is about a 9 year old who is experiencing stigma from friends it would not be appropriate to include content that discusses stigma that older adults experience from their friends.

Each of the two issues (within the clinical situation) should be identified/ presented and discussed and analyzed. During the analysis process, the theory/content from relevant articles (6 sources) is integrated into the analysis- to provide you and the reader with greater understanding of the issue within the situation.

For example you might want to talk about how a specific excerpt of content from an article:

• increases your understanding/ interpretation of issues/ aspects of clinical situation.
• supports the actions that you took in the situation.
• how the content/ position in an article is opposite from your experiences in the situation.

The theoretical content must be clearly related/ linked back to the situation you are discussing. For example if you are talking about an issue of family support and yet the theory you are presenting is talking about support from distant friends although this theory maybe interesting and informative it is not relevant to the issue.

We always encourage students (including ourselves when writing papers) to look back at what theory (content) that we have included and to ensure that it is relevant for the issues being discussed and if it has nothing to do and does not support my analysis and discussion of that issue we remove it and look for more relevant theory that is specific to what we are wanting to discus.

We encourage you to go back and ensure that you link each piece of theory (discuss it within the context of the issue) as you present in the paper to show the relevance/ your understanding.

This section should be about 2 pages in length.

Step 6 – Discussion/ analysis of how future practice may be influenced

In this section you will discuss how your analysis of the clinical situation and theory presented in the paper may influence your future nursing practice. I encourage you to bring examples from your analysis section (the previous section). This section should be about 3/4 pages in length.

Step 7 – Conclusion or summary

In this section you need to first make the decision to write either 1) a conclusion for your paper or 2) a summary. Your decision should be reflected in the heading you use. So if you are choosing to write a summary the heading used should be: “Summary” and if you are writing a conclusion then the heading should be: “Conclusion”.

The two are very distinct. A summary provides the reader with an overview of some of the key elements in the paper. A conclusion is an afterthought, sometimes reflective in nature providing the reader with insight to your final ” aha” of the paper. Both are considered acceptable and receive the same weight in the grading process.

This section should be about 1/2 page in length.

Step 8 – Introduction

You maybe asking why we have suggested that you wait to write the introduction until after you have written the paper? The reason for this is that your introduction should provide an overview of what will be in the paper and what the reader has to look forward to. Some would say you really cannot say what will be in your paper until you write it.

Your introduction should include the following:

• Identify the concept that you will be presenting
• Identify the 2 issues of the concept that you will be exploring
• Identify what the reader will read about in the paper in a sequential order. For example:
  Within this paper I will explore the xxxx concept and yyy and, zzz, issues. A clinical situation will be presented in which I will explore each of the above issues. As well, I will discuss briefly both professionally and personally why I have chosen to present this situation. I will discuss and analyze each of the above issues as they presented in the situation and after this I will discuss how my future practice may be influenced by the contents of the paper. Finally, I will present a brief summary of the paper.
• The introduction should be a paragraph in length

Some additional considerations for the paper

• Headings must be used. We have provided you with all the headings that are APA formatted
• Keep the grading sheet near you as you complete your paper and before you submit your paper go through it to ensure you have met each of the criteria.
• Prior to your submitting your paper, review your paper using the student self-feedback sheet. If during your review you check off “somewhat” or “no” in any section please ensure you go back to this section in your paper and make any additions/ changes that may need to be made.
• The length of the paper is 8-10 pages including the title and reference pages.

Headings:

The following headings should be used in your paper.

Introduction

Description of Clinical Situation

Discussion of Relevance of Clinical Situation/ Topic to Student Both Personally & Professionally

Identification, Discussion, and Analysis of 2 Issues of the Concept Within the Clinical Situation

Issue 1:

Issue 2:

Discussion/ Analysis of How My Future Practice May be Influenced

Conclusion/ Summary

feedback sheet for the paper

The grading/ feedback sheet that will be utilized is provided below.