Principles of Systems-based Practice

Nurse leaders understand the correlation between stronger teams and achievement of set goals and objectives. Nurse leaders, therefore, aspire to motivate, direct and inspire the whole team to achieve better results as a team and not necessarily as an individual. Having worked in an emergency room, I understand the important role played by nurse leaders. Nurse leaders coordinate team members and ensure that everything is running in the right manner. Furthermore, the nurse also liaises with other teams in such a hospital unit to improve patient safety and experience. In my experience in a rural clinic and emergency room, I realized that nurse leaders have an important role to play in clinical settings. Nurse leaders oversee the process in which different elements of patient care are integrated for the benefit of the patient. The nurse leaders also possess interpersonal skills to address conflicts among nurses and other members from different teams.

I will integrate my knowledge in systems based nursing and evidence based practice to inform different decisions while handling patients. System-based approach in nursing refers to a leadership approach that views the health care setting as a body and the different departments as organs. For the body to perform optimally, all the organs have to be in optimal performance as well. Systems-based approach in nursing integrates well with evidence based practice (EBP). EBP refers to the problem-solving approach in nursing which uses the best evidence from patient care data and scholarly studies to inform nursing and clinical decisions. According to Renolen et al. (2019), the aim of EBP is to improve patient outcomes in clinical settings. The goals are the same with those of systems-based nursing which uses a patient-centric approach to improve patient safety. After reviewing both approaches, I believe that as a nurse leader, the systems based approach provides a holistic strategy that takes into consideration all the stakeholders in a clinical setting. I am proponent of transformational leadership style. I believe that a nurse leader should not only show direction but also empower junior nurses to develop nursing leadership skills to take up the mantle in future.

Reference

Renolen, Å., Hjälmhult, E., Høye, S., Danbolt, L. J., & Kirkevold, M. (2019). Evidence‐based practice integration in hospital wards—The complexities and challenges in achieving evidence‐based practice in clinical nursing. Nursing Open, 6: 815–823 . https://doi.org/10.1002/nop2.259