Bon Secours Memorial College of Nursing

NUR 4143P - Clinical Immersion

Professional Meeting Reflection

Professional nursing meeting experience (4 hours)

Guide for Reflection Using Tanner’s (2006) Clinical Judgment Model
Introduction

What professional nursing meeting(s) did you attend and where was it located?
St. Mary UBC Meeting, NSTU Unit meeting held August 26 Noon to 2:30 pm (2 ½ hours)
Background: With COVID, all meetings had been put on hold and all subcommittees ceased.
Describe the purpose of this professional nursing meeting? Describe the agendas of the group and subgroup. What
type of issues did they address?

This was the first meeting since March in an attempt to reactivate the involvement of the unit, reassign leadership
and begin establishing a set meeting time for UBC to gather again. This meeting was to help assign key leadership
roles, establish committee activity, plan for future meetings, discuss current issues and evaluations, and talk about
new management interviews, new hires to help with department turnover.
Noticing

What did you notice about the professional nursing meeting initially? Describe what you saw, heard and did during
the meeting?

What was obvious is that the people attending felt it was important to give back and help ensure the quality of the
unit continues and that the nurses have a place to have a voice. Nurses, many with only 1-2 years on unit, were
willing to be active, seeking opportunities to earn credit toward advancement. Leadership was very open, directing
the meeting, but willing to be an open ear to unit feedback in an effort to be more supportive. I saw a well organized
meeting with a nice agenda flow with goals to re-establish unit engagement.

Interpreting

Describe what you thought about the information being discussed. Have you been involved in similar discussion
during your previous student nurse experiences? Describe the similarities and/or differences to those encounters.

What I thought about was how well the staff presented unit strengths and felt able to approach management with
concerns such as too frequently floating to fill other units that did as highly trained nursing level staff, pulling oUAB
staff daily, and upcoming stroke center evaluation prep needed. Nurses were able to speak up about the need to
push back on some float requests to ensure best care as a ICU stepdown unit. This ability to speak openly about
seen areas of concerns I had not seen as a student, but opened my eyes to feel that concerns on a unit level won’t
have to go unspoken or ignored. The voice of a concerned nurse can be heard on the unit.

Responding

Describe stresses (both positive & negative) you experienced as you responded to the new learning or the challenge.

One stress I felt was the pressure placed upon the unit charge to question and push back on requests for immediate
down grades due to capacity, to pull staff to fill other units, with patterns seen in particular nursing supervisor staff.
Requests to address with upper management were welcomed, and an open discussion allowed the unit manager to
best understand the message she would be crafting to address the issue and ask for review and responsiveness she
can relay back to the unit.

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Reflection-in-Action

What role would you take being assigned to represent your unit in this group? What subcommittee would you like to
participate with and why?

I think that I would like to participate as a sub-committee unit leader in my first year. Patient experience felt like an
area that I would be observing, would be naive to norms and could look to help improve. Like asking the unit to
stock earplugs, for those patients that say the unit is just too noisy at night.

Reflection-on-Action and Clinical Learning

What written evidence is available to support professional nursing groups and their impact on the development of
evidence based practice and improved patient outcomes. Cite/reference all journal articles that contributed to the
evidence.
What is the value of professional nursing meetings both as a part of a healthcare system and within a professional
organization?
Value can be seen at the local unit level to increase employee satisfaction and help retain quality RN nurses on the
unit and avoid burnout and requests to transfer. Unity and support and leadership opportunities can help nurses feel
they have a voice and can help evoke change for positive outcomes.
Describe any changes in your values or feelings as a result of this experience.

I left the meeting feeling supported. I appreciated that the tone was open, accepting, honest about the issues and
ability to make changes, and that goals were set to help ensure the staff felt supported. The meeting closed with
guest speakers who were willing to do a mock interview of what to expect as Stroke Center evaluations were
occurring and our unit would be approached with sample questions to prove qualification and high training of staff.

The article I chose to review relative to this meeting was a review of how action learning approaches were providing
opportunities for new nurses to improve their individual development as well as supervisory skills. Having had
guests come to prepare our team for an upcoming stroke evaluation review that would occur in our unit, I felt the
team valued the mock interview opportunity to have confidence that they would be able to perform well when
approached to participate. Items reviewed could easily be discussed and taken back to others on the unit to relieve
stress of upcoming evaluation.

New nurses, in the first six to nine months, can be supported to a greater extent with trained preceptors and learning
opportunities that might extend past the unit. While focus will be on practical skill development during this time,
supportive services, and invitations to participate, such as the unit or hospital Unit Based Council (UBC) meeting
can offer changes to learn about new opportunities, receive opportunities, and become active. Nurse experience
plays such an important role in building a stronger nurse Offering new learning opportunities should be seeked out
by effective managers to introduce experiences to new nurses as well as allow experienced nurses to confirm and
expand learning. This will create a stronger nurse on a personal level feeling well supported no matter what
experience level. And to the unit and organization, improving educational level and performance can strengthen
patient care as well as support retention for quality trained staff.

Trish Riggan, I pledge. 10/1/2020

Reference:

Sommer, I., Larsen, K., Nielsen, C. M., Stenholt, B. V., & Bjørk, I. T. (2020). Improving Clinical Nurses'
Development of Supervision Skills through an Action Learning Approach. Nursing research and practice, 2020,
9483549. https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/9483549Approach. Nursing research and practice, 2020, 9483549.
https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/9483549

Nielsen, A., Stragnell, S., & Jester P (2007). Guide for reflection using the Clinical Judgment Model. Journal of
Nursing Education, 46(11), p. 513-516.

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