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Alexis Delgado

Grand Canyon University

NSG 436

Professor Kiley

06/08/22
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During this Clinical Management and Delegation Simulation, I was acting as a charge

nurse of a critical care unit. Charge nurses have a distinct function to play. These individuals

create a mix between managerial responsibilities and registered nurse medical skills as

caretakers, managers, liaisons, and point people. Charge nurses have a lot of burden on their

shoulders. In addition to care for their patients, they must be informed of everything that occurs

throughout their shifts. This includes organizing work, putting together timetables, tracking

admissions and discharges, and coordinating communication among nurses, doctors, and other

administrators. During their shifts, they are literally on the front lines of their unit. As acting

charge nurse, I organize procedures and patient care for the upcoming shift. I would allocate the

task at the start of a shift so that staff resources are used most efficiently. This includes taking

into account each nurse's unique knowledge, skills, and capacities. During their shift, I would

also assess patient outcomes. Being able to know how to prioritize people is very difficult,

because everyone is sick or injured but you have to decide who is more critical than the other. As

a charge nurse, you have to know which patients to give to the Rn vs the LPN and who gets a

UAP vs who does not. Both RNs and LPNs perform a wide range of patient care duties.

However, to fully understand the distinctions between the professions, it is crucial to understand

their scope of practice, which is the practices and professional duties that an RN and LPN are

legally allowed to practice under state law. Being a unit supervisor, you have to make some very

tough decisions, and some might not be in the favor of the nurses, and if the workload gets too

tough for some, you them by picking up some of their patients to allow them to not be as stressed

and offer better care to those patients. Charge nurses must have strong communication,

organizational, and leadership abilities. They must also be capable of making quick judgments,

assessing the quality of patient care, managing conflicts, and foreseeing issues before they occur.
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Charge nurses are hired for their personal qualities, such as problem-solving ability, as well as

their medical knowledge. At all times, they must display a high level of ambition,

professionalism, and knowledge of the bigger picture.

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References
Harrington, J. (2022, May 12). Leadership in Nursing: How to Become a Charge Nurse. Cartux.

https://online.carlow.edu/resources/article/how-to-become-a-charge-nurse/

Huber, D. L. (2018). Leadership and nursing care management (6th ed.). St. Louis, MO:

Elsevier-Saunders.