Nurses as Patient Advocates

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that patients often confide information through natural dialogue with nurses, expressing their understanding of their own health, their concerns about after-care, and personal needs they feel are or are not being met by other members of the health care team. The author points out that the greatest need for a patient advocate is in circumstances where temporary or chronic psychological diseases or processes, such as epilepsy, reduce the individual's ability to self-advocate. The paper relates that the position as advocate may put the nurse into circumstances of conflict with other care providers, especially doctors, but the role of the nurse is to advocate for the needs of the client.

From the Paper:

"The nurse has a distinct advantage, over many other health care professionals in that they often spend the most time with patients. In this role, they interact on a clinical as well as social level with the patient and in almost every setting learn things about the patient that others providing care may never know. It is for this reason that nurses are the most logical persons to act as advocates for patients. As an advocate for a patient a nurse might be able to influence care to better meet the holistic needs of patients."

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