<< Back to CCOG
Course Number:  NUR 141

Course Title: Fundamentals of Nursing

Credit Hours: 12

Lecture Hours: 60

Lecture/Lab Hours:

Lab Hours: 180

Special Fee: N/A

Course Description:

Presents concepts and skills that lay a foundation for entry into the nursing profession.  Provides opportunities to attain the knowledge and skills that are necessary to promote health, prevent disease, and deliver basic nursing care to individual patients across the lifespan.  The skills laboratory section is the first of five in the Nursing sequence.

 

Intended Outcomes for the course:

  1. Utilize an understanding of conceptual foundations of nursing; nursing process, critical thinking and holistic care, as they apply to the nursing role in care of patients with common health disturbances.
  2. Recognize how facts and principles from physical, biological, social, and behavioral sciences are applied to planning care for individuals across the life span.
  3. Apply selected health promotion concepts in care of patients from diverse backgrounds in various health care settings
  4. Use therapeutic and professional communication techniques in the clinical setting.
  5. Provide basic nursing care for patients using facts and principles from physical, biological, social, and behavioral sciences.
  6. Distinguish between personal and professional values, and legal/ethical responsibilities in practice
  7. Follow standard safety and infection control measures to perform nursing skills correctly in the skills practice laboratory.

Course Activities and Design:

  1. Lecture
  2. Skills practice lab with patient scenario simulation
  3. Clinical
  4. Reflective journaling
  5. Assignments
  6. Community Based Project

Outcome Assessment Strategies:

  1. Satisfactory completion of electronic patient care planning tool (75% or above complete in all categories)
  2. Multiple choice, short answer, and essay questions that require integration, application, and critical examination of material covered in class
  3. Weekly and final clinical performance evaluation
  4. Written assignments designed to stimulate critical thinking related to clinical experiences.
  5. Written assignments designed to stimulate critical thinking related to theory content
  6. Written journals designed to promote integration of clinical outcomes with personal reflection and clinical experience.
  7. Skills practice lab formative and summative performance evaluation
  8. Completion of drug dose math exam at 90% or above.
  9. Completion of ATI comprehensive student assessment program (Skill modules: practice and proctored exams).

 

Course Content (Themes, Concepts, Issues and Skills):

  1. Conceptual Foundations of Nursing:
    1. Historical evolution of professional nursing, socialization to professional nursing, issues and trends in current nursing, program philosophy and conceptual framework
    2. Professional nursing practice, expanded nursing roles, nursing competencies and scope of practice (Intro Division 45 OSBN)
    3. Values, ethics and legal issues
    4. Caring for the older adult
    5. Health care in the community and home
    6. Communication in the nurse-patient relationship
    7. Culture & diversity
    8. Health, wellness and complementary medicine
  1. Clinical Nursing Care:
    1. Safety
    2. Infection prevention and management
    3. Mobility
    4. Sleep and rest
    5. Pain management
    6. Nutrition
    7. Cardiac and respiratory Function
    8. Urinary and Bowel Elimination
    9. Life span development
    10. Cognitive processes
    11. Families and their relationships
    12. Loss and grieving
    13. Spiritual health
    14. Stress, coping and adaptation;
    15. Human sexuality
  2. Clinical Nursing Therapies
    1. Health assessmentNursing Process:
    2. Understanding the application of nursing process in developing individualized plans for patient care.
    3. Foundation for practice; documentation and communication in the health care team: patient medical recordIntroduction to Pharmacology and drug dose calculations.

 

Skills

  1. Hygiene skills
  2. Transmission based and standard precautions
  3. Safe patient handling and body mechanics
  4. Moving, positioning, and transferring patients
  5. Conduct and document adult health assessment with vital signs
  6. Oxygen therapy
  7. Medication administration and drug dose calculation. Parenteral (IM, Sub-Q, ID) and non-parenteral
  8. Specimen collection: urine, stool, sputum and finger stick blood glucose
  9. Electronic Health Record documentation

Related Instruction

 Computation Hours:  40

Course Outcomes:

  • Provide basic nursing care for patients using facts and principles from physical, biological, social, and behavioral sciences.
  • Follow standard safety and infection control measures to perform nursing skills correctly in the skills practice laboratory.

Content:

  • Students are required to complete self-study modules with regard to drug dose calculations and medication administration.
  • Required Self-Study: Dosage Calculation and Skill Modules through ATI (Assessment Technologies Institute): including: Safe Dosage; Medication Administration (two different modules); Oral Medications Injectable Medications, Powdered Medications and Parenteral Medications and related case studies. 25 item exam with each module plus a proctored exam per term.
  • Dosage calculation and safe medication administration skill modules include online tutorials that are designed to support students in learning the basics of safe medication administration. These modules improve comprehension and critical-thinking math skills in relation to safely calculating medication dosages. Students practice clinical reasoning and problem-solving skills while working through in-depth and real-life case scenarios (related to drug dose calculation), at their own pace. In the clinical, skills lab and simulation environments, under the direct supervision of a nursing instructor the student puts into direct practice those elements that have been presented in the independent study modules.

Content:

  • Students are required to complete self-study modules with regard to drug dose calculations and medication administration.
  • Required Self-Study: Dosage Calculation and Skill Modules through ATI (Assessment Technologies Institute): including: Safe Dosage; Medication Administration (two different modules); Oral Medications Injectable Medications, Powdered Medications and Parenteral Medications and related case studies. 25 item exam with each module plus a proctored exam per term.
  • Dosage calculation and safe medication administration skill modules include online tutorials that are designed to support students in learning the basics of safe medication administration. These modules improve comprehension and critical-thinking math skills in relation to safely calculating medication dosages. Students practice clinical reasoning and problem-solving skills while working through in-depth and real-life case scenarios (related to drug dose calculation), at their own pace. In the clinical, skills lab and simulation environments, under the direct supervision of a nursing instructor the student puts into direct practice those elements that have been presented in the independent study modules.

 

Communication

Hours:  85

Course Outcomes:

  • Use therapeutic and professional communication techniques in the clinical setting.
  • Utilize an understanding of conceptual foundations of nursing; nursing process, critical thinking and holistic care, as they apply to the nursing role in care of patients with common health disturbances.
  • Recognize how facts and principles from physical, biological, social, and behavioral sciences are applied to planning care for individuals across the life span.

Content: 

  • The Profession of Nursing: Compare and contrast the following nursing roles: Nursing assistant, Licensed Practical Nurse, Registered Nurse, Advanced Registered Nurse Practitioner. Participate in verbal collaboration about patient care with other members of the nursing care team regarding progress towards desired outcomes. Demonstrate cooperation and teamwork by providing support and assistance to others when requested. Delegation:  Understand the roles of delegator and delegatee; receives delegation from staff RN and follows through appropriately
  • Communication in the nurse-patient relationship: Define the four main types of communication. Discuss the elements of the communication process and their relevance to nursing. Explain the nature of the nurse-patient relationship. Distinguish between a professional and social relationship. Discuss key ingredients of therapeutic communication. Identify assessment areas to address when communicating with patients. Discuss therapeutic and non-therapeutic techniques.
  • Grief and Loss: Identify methods of communication that facilitate the grieving process for patients and their family members. Identify methods for nurse self-care in grief and loss.
  • Health Assessment: Organize a nursing assessment. Differentiate between subjective and objective data. Describe the techniques of inspection, palpation, percussion and auscultation. Individualize the nursing assessment based on lifespan considerations. Describe methods to obtain subjective and objective data during the health assessment/physical exam
  • Infection prevention and management and safety: Describe nursing measures that promote healing and prevent infection transmission. Discuss the role of the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and Public Health Departments in infection control. Describe the components of Standard Precautions and Transmission Based precautions in the control of infection transmission. Differentiate between medical and surgical asepsis. Describe appropriate situations for using cleaning, is infection, and sterilization. Identify age related considerations preventing the transmission of infectious diseases
  • Nursing Process: Describe activities the nurse carries out during the evaluation phase of the nursing process. Describe the components of the patient plan of care. Differentiate situations when a registered nurse would prepare an individualized patient plan of care instead of using a standardized plan of care. Understand the relationships between knowledge, experience, critical thinking, reflection, clinical reasoning, and nursing judgment.
  • Pain Management: List the essential components of a comprehensive pain assessment and how to adapt it lifespan and cognition variations.
  • Spiritual Health: Discuss the influence of spiritual practices on the health status of clients. Explain the importance of establishing a caring relationship with clients to gain spiritual insight.
  • Stress, coping and adaptation: Describe various types of coping patterns people typically use to handle stress. Identify stress management techniques that nurses can use to help patients adapt to stress.

Activities:

include classroom discussion, focused on how to effectively communicate with members of the team, the patient and their family members; team building related activities; communicating with members of a team to accomplish tasks related to patient care; learning to communicate effectively in order to maintain a safe environment for all involved; reading for meaning by learning to read critically so as to interrupt patient data appropriately; identification  and use of correct terminology to support patient assessment and intervention and reflecting on progress towards outcomes through weekly journals. In the clinical, skills lab and simulation environments under the direct supervision of a nursing instructor the student puts into direct practice those elements that have been presented in the theory classroom setting.

Students are also required to do ATI Skill Modules, post classroom discussion for: health assessment; infection control; principles of safety care and teaching; nursing process and self-assessment for learning styles; testing and remediation and critical thinking entrance exam. These modules are independent learning modules that have pre and post exams.

Independent Assignment with instructor oversight: Through conducting this life review the student will increase their knowledge level and comfort level in conversing with the older adults and be able to identify that the person is aging in a positive manner regardless of barriers that may exist from their life conditions. The assignment provides an opportunity for nursing student to connect with older adults in the community setting. The student is required to interview with a senior for a life review assignment: Each student is to choose an adult age 70 or older who is not a family member or who they are familiar with to interview for a life review. The paper consists of three components: Introduction of the older adult; analysis of the Life review interview and Student’s reflection. The objectives behind this assignment include: increase their knowledge level and comfort level in conversing with the older adults and be able to identify if the person is aging in a positive manner regardless of barriers that may exist from their life conditions. The assignment provides an opportunity for nursing student to connect with older adults in the community setting.

 

Human Relations

Hours:  80

Course Outcomes:

Curriculum Content and Objectives for topics related to Communication

  • The Profession of Nursing: Compare and contrast the following nursing roles: Nursing assistant, Licensed Practical Nurse, Registered Nurse, Advanced Registered Nurse Practitioner. Participate in verbal collaboration about patient care with other members of the nursing care team regarding progress towards desired outcomes. Demonstrate cooperation and teamwork by providing support and assistance to others when requested. Delegation:  Understand the roles of delegator and delegatee; receives delegation from staff RN and follows through appropriately
  • Communication in the nurse-patient relationship: Define the four main types of communication. Discuss the elements of the communication process and their relevance to nursing. Explain the nature of the nurse-patient relationship. Distinguish between a professional and social relationship. Discuss key ingredients of therapeutic communication. Identify assessment areas to address when communicating with patients. Discuss therapeutic and non-therapeutic techniques.
  • Grief and Loss: Identify methods of communication that facilitate the grieving process for patients and their family members. Identify methods for nurse self-care in grief and loss.
  • Health Assessment: Organize a nursing assessment. Differentiate between subjective and objective data. Describe the techniques of inspection, palpation, percussion and auscultation. Individualize the nursing assessment based on lifespan considerations. Describe methods to obtain subjective and objective data during the health assessment/physical exam
  • Infection prevention and management and safety: Describe nursing measures that promote healing and prevent infection transmission. Discuss the role of the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and Public Health Departments in infection control. Describe the components of Standard Precautions and Transmission Based precautions in the control of infection transmission. Differentiate between medical and surgical asepsis. Describe appropriate situations for using cleaning, is infection, and sterilization. Identify age related considerations preventing the transmission of infectious diseases.
  • Nursing Process: Describe activities the nurse carries out during the evaluation phase of the nursing process. Describe the components of the patient plan of care. Differentiate situations when a registered nurse would prepare an individualized patient plan of care instead of using a standardized plan of care. Understand the relationships between knowledge, experience, critical thinking, reflection, clinical reasoning, and nursing judgment.
  • Pain Management: List the essential components of a comprehensive pain assessment and how to adapt it lifespan and cognition variations.
  • Spiritual Health: Discuss the influence of spiritual practices on the health status of clients. Explain the importance of establishing a caring relationship with clients to gain spiritual insight.
  • Stress, coping and adaptation: Describe various types of coping patterns people typically use to handle stress. Identify stress management techniques that nurses can use to help patients adapt to stress.

Activities: include classroom discussion, focused on how to effectively communicate with members of the team, the patient and their family members; team building related activities; communicating with members of a team to accomplish tasks related to patient care; learning to communicate effectively in order to maintain a safe environment for all involved; reading for meaning by learning to read critically so as to interrupt patient data appropriately; identification  and use of correct terminology to support patient assessment and intervention and reflecting on progress towards outcomes through weekly journals. In the clinical, skills lab and simulation environments under the direct supervision of a nursing instructor the student puts into direct practice those elements that have been presented in the theory classroom setting.

Students are also required to do ATI Skill Modules, post classroom discussion for: health assessment; infection control; principles of safety care and teaching; nursing process and self-assessment for learning styles; testing and remediation and critical thinking entrance exam. These modules are independent learning modules that have pre and post exams.

Independent Assignment with instructor oversight: Through conducting this life review the student will increase their knowledge level and comfort level in conversing with the older adults and be able to identify that the person is aging in a positive manner regardless of barriers that may exist from their life conditions. The assignment provides an opportunity for nursing student to connect with older adults in the community setting. The student is required to interview with a senior for a life review assignment: Each student is to choose an adult age 70 or older who is not a family member or who they are familiar with to interview for a life review. The paper consists of three components: Introduction of the older adult; analysis of the Life review interview and Student’s reflection. The objectives behind this assignment include: increase their knowledge level and comfort level in conversing with the older adults and be able to identify if the person is aging in a positive manner regardless of barriers that may exist from their life conditions. The assignment provides an opportunity for nursing student to connect with older adults in the community setting.

Content:

  • Caring for the Older Adult: Describe the effect of loss and grief, loneliness, and coping and stress on the health of geriatric patients. Explain the role of values, beliefs, and spirituality in quality of life in older patients.
  • Healthcare in the community and in the home: Discuss the role of nurses in different health care delivery settings. Describe elements of a community assessment. Describe the management of healthcare needs in the home from a systems perspective.
  • Culture and diversity: Discuss characteristics and concepts related to culture. Build an understanding of people by viewing human responses in cultural context. Identify patterns of one’s own and others’ behavior that reflect stereotypical thinking and ethnocentric assumptions. Demonstrate an increased awareness of one’s own culture and its influence on one’s own nursing practice.
  • Families and their relationships: Discuss evidence-based nursing interventions for altered family function. Discuss evidence-based nursing interventions to promote family health and function. Evaluate the possible impact of altered family function on activities of daily living. Discuss evidence-based nursing interventions for altered family function. Discuss evidence-based nursing interventions to promote family health and function. Demonstrate evolving ability to manage patient care through effective interpersonal relationship with staff, peers patients and instructors. Demonstrates sound judgment and effective interpersonal relationships while functioning as an effective interdisciplinary team member.
  • Loss and grieving: Describe the holistic needs of the dying and their support systems, considering cultural, religious and developmental differences as well as legal issues in the provision of nursing care. Describe the role of the nurse in working with support systems of dying clients.
  • Lifespan and development: Describe developmental tasks for the different age groups according to Erikson. Describe physical, psychosocial, and cognitive developmental patterns from toddlerhood through adolescence. Describe variables influencing how children learn about and perceive their health status. Discuss ways in which the nurse is able to help parents meet their children’s developmental needs.
  • Spiritual Health: Identify nursing interventions designed to promote spiritual health. Identify the impact of the nurse’s personal beliefs and spirituality on the way the nurse attends to the spiritual needs of patients.
  • Grief and Loss: Describe the holistic needs of the dying and their support systems, considering cultural, religious and developmental differences as well as legal issues in the provision of nursing care. Describe the role of the nurse in working with support systems of dying clients. Identify measures that facilitate the grieving process. Recognize physiological changes that occur as persons move toward death and when the concept of hospice is typically introduced in the care of the dying. Identify the nurse’s role in assisting clients experiencing loss, grief, or death.

Activities:

Activities include classroom discussion, in-class case studies related to content area; team building activities in order to assist the student in understanding the role of human relations in patient care. Independent study includes video clips related to content area along with reading assignments. In the clinical, skills lab and simulation environments under the direct supervision of a nursing instructor the student puts into direct practice those elements that have been presented in the theory classroom setting.

np\shared\PCC\CCOGS  3/20