Nursing Term Paper

Importance of Theory: Dorothea E. Orem the Self-Care Theory

Importance of Theory: Dorothea E. Orem the Self-Care Theory
The field of nursing has various theories that are elemental in the nursing practice. These theories define the proper ways of handling issues in the nursing practice as well as the regulations or ethical issues in the nursing practice. Each of the nursing theories influences the nursing practice in distinct ways. This paper identifies and discusses Dorothea Orem’s Self-Care Theory in nursing. The theory of self-care is about the relationship between the individual, which in the case of nursing, is the patient, the health, nursing, and the environment in which these elements occur. According to Orem, self-care encompasses the practice of various activities that people perform after initiating on their behalf in the maintenance of health, well-being, and life.

Analysis of Importance of the Self-care Theory to Nursing

The self-care theory has great significance go the nursing practice as a profession. First, the self-care theory, which encompasses the self-care of individuals, includes the activities that these people perform on their behalf. As such, the postulation of this theory enables the patients or individuals to manage their health on their own. That is; they are in authority of maintaining their well-being in life. This theory does so by enabling these individuals act as their self-care agency that refers to the capacity to engage in self-care, conditioned by life experience, age, socio-cultural orientation, developmental stage, available resources, and health (Bhanji, 2012). The self-care theory also has the demand for therapeutic self-care. It encompasses the total action self-care to be performed over a certain period to meet the requisites of self-care with related sets of actions, operations, and valid methods.
The self-care requisites also contribute to the significance of this theory to the nursing practice and profession. These requisites are elemental, and they are in categories of developmental, health deviation, and universal requisites. Each of these requisites influences the nursing practice in distinct ways. For instance, the requisites of universal care are associated with the processes of life and the maintenance of the ethics and integrity of the human functioning and structure. These requisites, also known as the daily living, influence the nursing profession in different ways. First, they are concerned with maintaining sufficient intake of water, air, and food, which are the core elements that promote the well-being and the health of these individuals (Bhanji, 2012). Second, these requisites provide for the provision of care for the elimination process. They also provide a balance between rest and activities, as well as between social interaction and solitude. With these elements, nurses have the capacity to assist, guide, or counsel individuals on how to implement or apply them in their self-care management, which is a core aspect in the prevention of diseases.
These requisites also provide the various ways of preventing hazards to the human life and their well-being. Lastly, these requisites promote the human functioning. The self-care of health deviation, provided for by the self-care theory is elemental in situations of disease, injury, or illness. It is important to the nursing profession because it enables individuals to seek and secure proper medical assistance (Bhanji, 2012). It also enhances the aspect of being aware and attending to the various results and effects of pathologic conditions. It is important because it enables individuals to carry out different medically prescribed procedures and measures. The self-care theory is elemental in the nursing practice because it enables individuals modify different self-concepts to acknowledge and accept themselves as being in certain states of health and particular health care forms. Lastly, self-care theory is important to the nursing profession because it enables individuals to live with various effects of the pathologic conditions.

Summary of Key Concepts

The self-care theory has different concepts that add to its meaning and foster the understanding of the theory. The first concept is nursing. According to the theory, nursing is the art through which nursing practitioners give specialized assistance to individuals with disabilities that makes more than the ordinary assistance elemental in meeting self-care needs. The nurses or practitioners also participate intelligently in the medical care that these persons receive from the physicians. Humans are another major concept, and they encompass women, children, and men cared for either as social units or singly and are material objects of the nurses who provide the direct care. The third major concept of this theory is the environment (Kemppainen, Tossavainen, & Turunen, 2012). This concept suggests that the environment has biological, physical, and chemical features. In addition, the environment includes the communities, cultures, and families. Health is the other major concept. The theory suggests that health is being functionally and structurally sound or whole. In addition, health is a state, which encompasses both the individual and group health whereas human health is the capacity to reflect an individual’s self, symbolize various experiences, and communicate with other individuals.
Self-care is another major concept of the theory, and it refers to the practice or the performance of activities that people perform after initiating on their behalf to maintain well-being, life, and health. Self-care agency is the human power or capacity to engage effectively in self-care. The basic conditioning aspects affect self-care agency. The other major concept of the theory is the basic conditioning aspects or factors. They include developmental states, gender, age, factors of the family system, health states, socio-cultural orientation, living patterns, resource availability and adequacy, environmental factors, and the factors of the healthcare system. The therapeutic demand of self-care is the other major concept of the self-care theory (Kemppainen, Tossavainen, & Turunen, 2012). It is the totality of the actions of self-care to be performed for a given duration to meet the known requisites of self-care using related sets of operations and actions, and valid methods. The self-care deficit is another concept of the theory, and it delineates when there is a need for nursing. For instance, nursing is needed when adults, or the parent or guardian in the case of dependents are incapable or limited in providing continuous and effective self-care.
Nursing agency is the other major concept of the self-care theory and it is a complex property or an attribute of individuals trained and educated as nurses, which enables them to know, act, and assist others meet their demands of therapeutic healthcare through the exercise or development of their agency of self-care. The last major concept of the theory is the nursing system. This system is the product of relations between individuals, usually legitimate nurses, and legitimate clients. The system is activated when therapeutic demands of self-care of the clients exceed the available agency of self-care, which leads to the nursing need.

Self-Care Theory in Nursing Leadership

The self-care nursing theory views the nursing leadership in various ways. This theory provides the model through which the nursing leadership promotes professional nursing practices as well as the self-care of individuals. First, the primary focus of the nursing leaders is the patient that includes families and significant others. As such, the self-care has to begin with the facilitation of self-care awareness to the patients by the nursing leaders (Kemppainen, Tossavainen, & Turunen, 2012). The second view of the theory of nursing leadership is the autonomy of the nurses to make decisions about nursing practice. These decisions include the implementation or the promotion of self-care among individuals in communities. The third view is the accountability of the nurse leaders for the practices and the outcome of the nursing care. It encompasses conscientious application of various critical thinking aspects as well as the evidence-base decision-making.
During a visit to a local dispensary, I attended a brief where the nursing administrator was reiterating the effective collaboration and communications among the healthcare providers in terms of promoting and educating the importance of self-care to the patients, as well as their visitors. In another situation where I saw the financial report of another hospital, there was a place allocated for the coordination and cost-effective use of the resources. On asking the administrator what the statement meant, the administrator responded by saying the resources were for the nursing training on self-care issues.
In conclusion, the self-care theory by Dorothea Orem is elemental because it talks about an individual’s self-management of their health. In addition, it encompasses the health and the environment in which these individuals operate. The theory is of great significance to the nursing practice and encourages the facilitation of the same in nursing leadership. The theory contains various requisites, including the universal requisites that play a significant role in the understanding of the application of the theory. The theory has several major concepts that revolve around the humans, the environments, the nursing settings, and the practice of nursing. Other concepts include the health, self-care itself, the nursing agency, and the therapeutic demand of self-care.

References

Bhanji, S. M. (2012). Comparison and Contrast of Orem's Self Care Theory and Roy's Adaptation Model. Journal of Nursing, 1(1), 48-53.
Kemppainen, V., Tossavainen, K., & Turunen, H. (2012). Nurses' roles in health promotion practice: an integrative review. doi:10.1093/heapro/das034