Using the theory of unpleasant symptoms as a guide, what would you look for in an assessment tool for patient symptoms ?

Using the theory of unpleasant symptoms as a guide, what would you look for in an assessment tool for patient symptoms?

Nurses play an essential role in analyzing a patient’s symptoms, which is also a crucial part of their practice. The role of nurses in the health care field is primarily focused on the symptoms that the patients demonstrate. According to Blakeman (2019), the nurses determine the patient’s symptoms, assess the factors that may result in a change in the symptoms, and devise management and prevention strategies to deal with the symptoms. The nurses also help the patients with self-management of the symptoms and ongoing monitoring. The Theory of unpleasant symptoms (TOUS) is one of the vital approaches designed to help the nurses assess the patient systems von (Sadovszky et al., 2018). The approach is significant as it pinpoints the essential aspects of the symptoms to guide nursing practice and research. The Theory can also provide details on a nurse’s interest in an assessment tool for patient symptoms.

There are multiple aspects that nurses look for when searching for a tool to assess a patient’s symptoms. First, the patient’s self-reported symptoms must be contained in the assessment tool. The nurse derives the impacts of the illness and the treatment from the self- reported symptoms (Silva-Rodrigues et al., 2019). Also, the assessment tool that the nurse selects must pinpoint the various factors that influence the symptoms that the patient reports. While using the Theory of unpleasant symptoms to determine the best assessment tool for patient symptoms, it is imperative to look at the significant parts that this Theory concentrates on (Silva- Rodrigues et al., 2019). The Theory first focuses on the symptoms and defines them subjectively as reported by the patients. It then assesses the factors influencing the symptoms, such as gender, age, and variables allied to the disease. Such factors may affect the patient’s perception of the symptoms. The Theory also considers the social and physical environment outside the patient that may affect the symptoms. Therefore, the assessment tools must address growth, child development, situational issues and physiology, among others (Gomes et al., 2019). Such issues are vital in allowing the nurse to better comprehend the patient’s condition. The nurse’s assessment tool must also address the factors that influence the patient’s symptoms, as underlined by the Theory of unpleasant symptoms. Such considerations include culture, gender, age and language, among others.

Conclusively, the Theory of unpleasant symptoms can help the nurse select the best amassment tool for patient symptoms by offering a framework for evaluating the signs. The assessment tool selected must describe three key elements: the identity of the symptoms, the performance outcome, and the factors that influence the symptoms.

References

Blakeman, J. R. (2019). An integrative review of the theory of unpleasant symptoms. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 75(5), 946–961. https://doi.org/10.1111/jan.13906

Gomes, G. L. L., Oliveira, F. M. R. L. de, Barbosa, K. T. F., Medeiros, A. C. T. de, Fernandes, M. das G. M., & Nóbrega, M. M. L. da. (2019). THEORY OF UNPLEASANT

SYMPTOMS: CRITICAL ANALYSIS. Texto & Contexto – Enfermagem, 28. https://doi.org/10.1590/1980-265x-tce-2017-0222

Silva-Rodrigues, F. M., Hinds, P. S., & Nascimento, L. C. (2019). The Theory of Unpleasant Symptoms in Pediatric Oncology Nursing: A Conceptual and Empirical Fit? Journal of Pediatric Oncology Nursing, 36(6), 436–447. https://doi.org/10.1177/1043454219844225

von Sadovszky, V., Christensen, E., Jennings, B. M., Miller, S., Hosley, S., Drought, L., & Lenz,R. (2018). A systematic review of pediatric self-report symptom measures: Congruence with the theory of unpleasant symptoms. Journal for Specialists in Pediatric Nursing, 23(2), e12215. https://doi.org/10.1111/jspn.12215

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