Response 1 

For this course my expectations are relative to getting acclimated to transitioning from the mindset of the nursing perspective to that of an advanced practice provider. Although, even with this new perspective I anticipate it would be wise to continue harnessing my nursing intuition and use a holistic approach that make patients feel comforted yet confident in learning self-care. I expect to gain more knowledge and experience with writing SOAP notes, gathering information efficiently through the patient interview as well as with the examination, deducing appropriate diagnoses, and now determining the appropriate plan of care.

            To provide the best level of care when examining and diagnosing patients within a nurse practitioner role, consideration of my strengths and challenges for nursing practice competencies would help me set goals for my path throughout this course as well as future courses. A few nursing practice competencies I already have proven as my strengths within my current nursing experience include the following as defined by The National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties (2012): using my leadership skills to collaborate interdisciplinary teams to promote high-quality healthcare, evaluating ways to decrease cost without sacrificing quality care, and helping patients find ways to get increased access to care through community resources. A few challenges I currently experience mainly due to being a novice in the advanced practitioner role would be nursing competencies such as data analysis and research translation as it applies to improving current nurse practitioner practices (The National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties, 2012).

            This course will help with strengthening patient interviewing techniques within the nurse practitioner role, to allow for not only obtaining the medical health history, but also to find out best strategies to obtain the patient’s self-care preferences, spiritual needs, potential barriers to care, and social determinants of health. The significance of gaining this type of knowledge from this course is that as advance practice providers we can continue to provide holistic care and teach self-care techniques to patients with diagnoses such as heart failure and COPD, increasing patient compliance and efficacy of prescribed treatment (Hancerlioglu et al., 2019). For patients have difficulty with learning or managing self-care, it is critical for advanced practice providers to collaborate with other disciplines to determine the most effective plan of care while also utilizing community resources (Featherstone, 2018). The combination of holistic patient-centered care, promoting education of self-care techniques to patients with chronic illnesses, and ongoing monitoring of efficacy of prescribed treatments all have proven as effective ways to help patients adhere to proper self-care on a long-term basis (Gregg et al., 2020).

Response 2

Strengths and Challenges Related to Nursing Practice Competencies”

The global annual growth of the nurse practitioner (NP) workforce has been estimated to be between three to nine times greater compared to physicians (Woo, B., Lee, J., & Tam, W., 2017). Advance practice nurses play an integral role in treating patients with chronic conditions and with complex acute and critical illnesses. Additionally, they have a positive impact on the quality of care, clinical outcomes, patient satisfaction, and cost savings.

As an advanced practice nursing student in the Family Practitioner Program, my expectations for this class is to acquire the fundamental knowledge, skills and core competencies needed to succeed while utilizing evidence-based practice in the clinical settings (The National Organization of Nurse Practitioner Faculties. (2012). Furthermore, another expectation is to strengthen my communication skills and build interpersonal relationships by networking both internally and externally.

My role has a registered nurse enables me to provide direct care to patients while applying nursing competencies in the acute care setting. Some of the strengths I possess include cultural competence, professional judgment, personal characteristics, and professional responsibility (Fukada M., 2018). Although these characteristics can enhance the quality of nursing care on the other hand, for example, as a registered nurse working with adults in the intensive care unit  we are faced with many challenges which can result in burnout. Moreover, having a positive attitude and remaining professional competent will help to overcome these obstacles. Some of the challenges that I personally face include time management, stress and exhaustion.

Career goals

            I would love to develop new skills, invest in myself while working on being the best advance nurse practitioner I can be to serve my community. I also would like to obtain my doctorate of nursing practice (DNP) degree as my ultimate goal. Having a DNP degree will prepare me for further leadership roles, help me make changes within the health system and start my own practice.