Nursing Fundamentals: Psychosocial Wellbeing, Person-Centered Care, and Care Coordination

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering therapeutic communication, evidence-based practice, grief assessment, emotional intelligence, care coordination, nursing standards, HIPAA, delegation, and medication safety.

Therapeutic Communication Techniques (Do's and Don'ts)

Guidelines for clinical communication that encourage open-ended questions, active listening, and a calm voice while prohibiting close-ended statements, asking 'WHY', giving advice, or talking about oneself.

Restating

A clarifying technique in therapeutic communication that involves repeating what the client said using exact words.

Paraphrasing

A clarifying technique in therapeutic communication that involves restating what the client said in different words.

Reflecting

A clarifying technique in therapeutic communication that involves directing the client's questions or statements back to the client for consideration.

Complicated Grief

A form of grief characterized by expected grief reactions persisting long after the loss occurred, such as continuing 2 years later.

Evidence-Based Practice (EBP)

A decision-making approach in clinical care that integrates the best current evidence, clinical expertise, and patient values and preferences.

PICO Question

A structured framework used to convert clinical concerns into research questions, representing Patient/Population (P), Intervention (I), Comparison (C), and Outcome (O).

Clinical Expertise

A component of evidence-based practice consisting of nursing judgment, clinical experience, patient assessment skills, and knowledge of available resources.

Emotional Intelligence in Nursing

The application of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship management to regulate reactions and communicate empathetically and purposefully.

Micro-Behaviors

Small, intentional nursing actions that demonstrate compassionate care, including being at eye level, warm introductions, asking permission before care, using plain language, acknowledging discomfort, undivided attention, and following through.

Nursing Process (ADPIE)

A 5-step systematic, problem-solving framework consisting of Assessment, Diagnosis/Analysis, Planning, Implementation, and Evaluation to deliver individualized patient care.

Care Coordination

The deliberate synchronization of activities and information to improve health outcomes by meeting the healthcare and community service needs and preferences of patients and families over time.

Scope of Nursing Practice

The legal definition and boundaries of what registered nurses are legally permitted to perform, reflecting professional values and standards (such as ANA's 17 standards).

Standards of Nursing Care

The knowledge and skill ordinarily possessed and used by nurses, derived from healthcare laws, best practice guidelines, professional white papers, and evidence-based nursing knowledge.

Care Bundles

A succinct set of 3 to 5 evidence-based interventions that, when performed collectively and reliably, result in significantly better patient outcomes than when performed individually.

Six Functions of Clinical Judgment

The 6 cognitive skills used in clinical decision-making: Recognize cues, Analyze cues, Prioritize hypotheses, Generate solutions, Take action, and Evaluate outcomes.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

A prioritization model developed by Abraham Maslow structuring human needs into Physiological Needs, Safety & Security, Love & Belonging Needs, Self-Esteem, and Self-Actualization.

Minimum Necessary Standard

A requirement under the HIPAA Privacy Rule specifying that health record access must be limited to the specific Protected Health Information (PHI) needed for a designated purpose.

Six Rights of Medication Administration

Mandatory safety checks required for every medication administration: Right Client, Right Medication, Right Dose, Right Route, Right Time, and Right Documentation.

High-Alert Medications

Medications that carry a heightened risk of causing significant patient harm if administered in error—including concentrated potassium chloride, insulin, heparin, chemotherapy, and oxytocin—requiring independent double verification.

Delegation Principles in Nursing

Rules establishing that RNs must assess patient stability and task complexity, communicate specific data collection parameters, provide supervision, evaluate outcomes, and retain legal accountability without delegating the nursing process itself.

Interprofessional Care Team

A collaborative healthcare structure positioning the patient at the center of integrated care surrounded by Medicine, Nurses & APPs, Pharmacy, Biomedical Sciences, Other Allied Health Professions, Social Work, Physical & Occupational Therapy, and Dieticians & Nutritionists.