Opinion Article on Empowering Nurses: The Cornerstone of Exceptional Patient Care

The patients' journey is a complex network involving multiple layers of impactful stakeholders, among these stakeholders are nurses. Nurses' impact is critical to achieving better health outcomes and an uplifted experience, yet there are gaps in supporting nurses and empowering them to maximize their contribution to patients. Empowering nurses can take place in the form of educational support, recognition, and reducing their workload to limit their burn-out. The impact of such support to nurses would result in improved health outcomes, reduced mortality rates and an increase in patient satisfaction.

Experiential Fallibilism and Decision-Making Process: A Perspective from a Patient with Chronic Kidney Disease

Patient choice in healthcare follows a process in which references to evidence and experience are intertwined. From the perspective of a patient with chronic kidney disease, I propose experiential fallibilism as the use of uncertain evidence and experience, along with knowledge gained in new contexts, situations, and experiences, to attain truth and promote shared decision-making. Thus, because of their uncertain nature, both the patient's experience and the doctor's focus on evidence should be integrated into a decision-making process through a co-learning perspective so that they can mutually enrich each other and prevent inappropriate actions and decisions in other clinical contexts. The risks perceived by both the patient and the doctor should be valued equally to encourage an honest discussion of the benefits and drawbacks of the proposed treatments after considering the patient's social, economic, and medical situation. Further, experience measurement tools, both quantitative and qualitative, should be used or developed to test their transferability and effectiveness in contexts involving healthcare decisions between doctors and patients.

Patient Process-Based Well-Being With the Support of a Close Person

The area of patient well-being, from medical care to everyday life, can be seen as a mutual, value-driven co-creative whole. However, the principle of customer-centricity has not sufficiently taken into account the patient's need for a close person's support in the care and home environments, especially in Nordic healthcare systems. The patient's well-being in healthcare can be viewed as a process-like service experience, including perceptions of their own well-being and a need for support in confronting the deterioration in their health. Therefore, well-being in the care process is not based solely on treatment results. Patient care proceeds as a service process in which mutual value is formed through the exchange of information and mutual understanding between a patient (ie, consent provider) within their social context (ie, support provider) and a service provider (ie, healthcare professional) in achieving care results. In a professional and organization-oriented care culture, the support of a close person can be seen as an expansion of the value network of patient care, which, in addition to providing individual and organizational human resource benefits, improves the service process.

Giving Hope as a High Reliability Function of Health Care

We believe that reliably offering Hope should be one of the goals of the therapeutic relationship between clinician and patient. Establishing Hope as a target outcome creates opportunities for both patients and clinicians to find meaning in their journeys. This article defines Hope in a new way by quantifying Hope as the delta or increase in one's belief that a future positive state can be achieved.Though prior conceptual models of Hope have focused nearly exclusively on an individual's own agency and competence to achieve goals, we particularly emphasize the role of Other-specifically, that of the clinician-in promoting Hope for patients.We recommend a Hope Checklist for clinicians that incorporates (1) the process of eliciting and clarifying patient goals, (2) conveying the intent and ability to help, and (3) identifying realistic pathways forward with the specific intent to maximize patient confidence in the potential to achieve meaningful positive outcomes.

Craving Empathy: Studying the Sustained Impact of Empathy Training on Clinicians

Evidence is sparse when it comes to the longitudinal impact of educational interventions on empathy among clinicians. Additionally, most available research on empathy is on medical trainee cohorts. We set out to study the impact of empathy and communication training on practicing clinicians' self-reported empathy and whether it can be sustained over six months. An immersive curriculum was designed to teach empathy and communication skills, which entailed experiential learning with simulated encounters and didactics on the foundational elements of communication. Self-reported Jefferson Scale of Empathy (JSE) was scored before and at two points (1-4 weeks and 6 months) after the training. Overall, clinicians' mean self-empathy scores increased following the workshop and were sustained at six months. Specifically, the perspective taking domain of the empathy scale, which relates to cognitive empathy, showed the most responsiveness to educational interventions. Our analysis shows that a structured and immersive training curriculum centered on building communication and empathy skills has the potential to positively impact clinician empathy and sustain self-reported empathy scores among practicing clinicians.

Lessons From Starting a New Subspecialty in a Rural State

In starting a new pediatric rheumatology service in a rural state, we designed the practice to focus on patient access, patient quality, and patient experience. We created a clinical experience that starts with an intake call to optimize the face-to-face visit. A team-based care approach is used. Weekend appointments are offered to avoid school and work absence. The social determinants of health are addressed. In our first year, our patients have reported their appreciation for a high-touch, patient-centered experience.

Why Companion Animals Are Beneficial During COVID-19 Pandemic

Companion animals and pets can be helpful during the novel coronavirus-19 pandemic. Interactions with them and positive physical contact lead to a variety of physiological and psychological benefits. It also releases biochemicals which can further boost the immune system and enhance health and well-being. This perspective discusses the benefits of these interactions, the modes of interactions and the activities that can be used. It also highlights the individuals that should avoid this approach and the status of the animal’s health before engaging with them.