The nurse caring for a patient with recurrent abdominal pain of unknown origin addresses the patient by name and puts her hand on her shoulder and offers reassuring words:

"You'll be okay. Try not to think about things too much, if you can." How would you evaluate the nurse's verbal and nonverbal communication?
a. Words offer hope and consolation
b. Nurse's interaction is comforting
c. Response builds nurse–patient trust
d. Message provides false reassurance


D
Although addressing the patient by her preferred name and using nonthreatening, therapeutic touch (light hand on the shoulder), all convey caring and comfort and contribute to a therapeutic and trusting nurse–patient relationship, but the nurse telling the patient that everything will be fine is inappropriate when the situation is unknown. These well-meaning words are actually false reassurance, and can sabotage a trusting relationship. Such a response is uninformed, inaccurate, and may feel dismissive—even condescending—to the patient and acts as a barrier to therapeutic communication.

Nursing

You might also like to view...

A client with a broken arm is experiencing redness, warmth, and swelling of the arm. The client complains of pain and burning in the extremity. The nurse concludes that the client is experiencing a complication, and if left untreated, the extremity will:

1. need to be amputated. 2. be cool and cyanotic. 3. require surgery. 4. be placed in traction.

Nursing

When caring for an elderly client with postmenopausal osteoporosis, the nurse institutes measures based on the understanding that the client is at risk for which of the following?

A) Multiple myeloma B) Bone fracture C) Bone chondrosarcoma D) Osteosarcoma

Nursing

A framework for personal beliefs that guide one's values, decisions, and actions and determines responses in life is a(n) __________ __________

Fill in the blank with correct word

Nursing

The care plan for a battered woman will be most successful if the nurse:

a. Empowers the patient to make her own decisions b. Develops the plan and presents it to the woman c. Obtains photo evidence of the battery for use in court d. Has a family conference and mediates among the parties

Nursing