Stress management strategies for NP practice.

ABSTRACT: Knowledge of stress management strategies is helpful to NPs in clinical practice, as they frequently encounter patients or patients' family members who require assistance in managing acute stress. Patients or patients' family members may experience a high level of stress due to health factors such as pain, life-changing diagnoses, treatment options viewed as undesirable, and/or poor medical prognoses. In addition, healthcare visits, hospitalization, diagnostic tests, surgical procedures, and other treatments can cause stress for some patients. NPs should therefore be well informed about stress management strategies to be able to effectively educate and provide compassionate care for their patients. This article reviews four strategies designed to assist patients and/or their family members in reducing stress to allow for a more positive experience during a healthcare visit or hospitalization.

Providing Culturally Sensitive Nursing Care for Vulnerable Immigrant Populations.

Vulnerable immigrant populations require culturally sensitive nursing care that shows respect for their beliefs and values, and fosters trusting relationships by allowing the time required to communicate in their language of origin. Transcultural Nursing Theory (Leininger & McFarland, 2002) provides a philosophical foundation for nursing care of immigrant populations. Harsh political policies involving undocumented immigrants can erode trust and cause fear of all U.S. institutions, including the health-care system. Separating families in an effort to deter entry into the United States without documentation can lead to detrimental effects on the children (Perreira & Pedroza, 2019). The American Nurses Association's Code of Ethics for Nurses with Interpretive Statements (2015) addresses the protection of vulnerable populations.

Enhancing Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Cultural Competence in a Midwestern Primary Care Clinic Setting.

The process of initiating lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) cultural competencies and educational interventions developed to increase staff knowledge on LGBT culture and health issues is discussed, including a computer-based module and panel discussion. The module intervention showed a statistically significant increase (p = .033) of staff LGBT knowledge from pretest to posttest scores. An evaluation after the panel discussion showed that 72% of staff indicated they were more prepared for LGBT patient care.