Journal Entry

Clinical Skills Self-Assessment

Grace Eluma

March 08, 2021

Walden University

Clinical Assessment Self-Assessment

Clinical Skills

Clinical skills are very important in healthcare, significantly for nurses and other practitioners. Individual clinical abilities determine the way care is delivered to patients and influence clinical outcomes (Störmann et al., 2016). For this reason, it is important to have clinical skills that contribute to the better and more desirable provision of medical care. To begin with, I have the skill of identifying pain as a fifth vital sign. When an individual is sick, several vital signs can be used to identify an illness's presence, including body temperature, pulse rate, respiration rate, and blood pressure. These vital signs are crucial, and understanding them can help practitioners and nurses call doctors whenever they show these signs. Additionally, I also have experience in bedmaking, both occupied and unoccupied. These clinical skills are vital based on the differences in care delivery times (Miller, 1990). Another clinical skill that promotes efficiency and effectiveness in medical care entails communication with professional staff. I believe I have excellent communication skills that promote positive clinical outcomes.

Strengths

I can associate myself with several strengths based on the confidence level of performing the clinical skills. First, I am a good communicator, and I can interact with professional staff members without difficulty. Effective communication in medical care settings is an important aspect that must be considered (Lee & Gu, 2013). Thus, my excellent communication skills are one of my strong points. Secondly, I understand when a patient is experiencing pain as a fifth vital sign that may lead to serious outcomes. For this reason, I understand when to call a doctor regarding a patient and the signs they show. Another strong point entails the experience I have gained from my practicum activities. This information is important because it helps me comprehend what should and should not be done in healthcare environments.

Improvement Areas

Despite having several strong areas that promote my experience as a practitioner and apply my clinical skills, I have a few areas that I must work on. As an illustration, I need to improve my decision-making skills. In healthcare, making relevant skills is an important skill that people must have, including nurses and doctors (Wright et al., 2019). For this reason, I need to ensure that I have enhanced my decision-making abilities for better clinical execution and outcomes. Secondly, I also need to improve on my interaction with patients and other members. In most cases, I interact with people I know and ignore the people who do not know me. This behavior is not acceptable in healthcare settings because I could be ignoring a client who needs my help. Therefore, I must improve my interaction skills for increased engagement with more people in the hospital. Improving on these areas will be beneficial in my professional nursing career.

Goals and Objectives

Establishing goals and objectives is important for a successful practicum experience. First, I plan to study more about clinical skills and interact with professional staff members for advice and guidance. This will help me boost my individual understanding of the practicum experience. Secondly, I also plan to apply the relevant clinical skills in every opportunity I get by asking for experienced people's guidance. Applying the clinical skills will make it easy to improve care delivery and learning. Furthermore, I plan to increase my practicum experience interactions from one to two per day by establishing a flexible schedule. The interactions will be beneficial regarding the attainment of experience.

References

Lee, O. S., & Gu, M. O. (2013). The relationship between emotional intelligence and communication skill, clinical competence & clinical practice stress in nursing students. Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society, 14(6), 2749-2759.

Miller, G. E. (1990). The assessment of clinical skills/competence/performance. Academic medicine, 65(9), S63-7.

Störmann, S., Stankiewicz, M., Raes, P., Berchtold, C., Kosanke, Y., Illes, G., ... & Angstwurm, M. W. (2016). How well do final-year undergraduate medical students master practical clinical skills?. GMS journal for medical education, 33(4).

Wright, D. F., Anakin, M. G., & Duffull, S. B. (2019). Clinical decision-making: An essential skill for 21st-century pharmacy practice. Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy, 15(5), 600-606.