The Nurse and Patient Relationship: Anxious Patients
The nurse and patient relationship is a very important one when it comes to the overall experience, care, and health success of the patient. However, the nurse and patient relationship when it comes to anxious patients is very different than other patients. There are many ways that people handle receiving care, despite whether it is in a hospital, clinical, at home, etc., most people have an emotional or physical response to the newness and unknown of nursing care. However, one of the most difficult emotions to navigate is when a nurse is dealing with anxious patients.
The anxious patient is a very complex, multi-faceted patient and it is important that we recognize anxious patients and learn a few methods to making the experience easier and a success for all. It is very difficult to properly care for an anxious patient if you are not equipped with some of the tools that can make the entire visit smoother for all involved. There are four simple, easy, and useful ways to calm an anxious patient and improve the nurse and patient relationship.
Explain, explain, explain
The first way to calm an anxious patient is to constantly explain what you are doing. Explain what you are doing before you start doing it, while you are doing it, and once you are finished to recap what happened. It does not matter if you are simply washing your hands or doing a wound dressing change, it is vital that you are constantly explaining what is going on to the patient, why it is necessary for their treatment, and how it is going to affect them. If it is a painful procedure or something that is uncomfortable make sure you are overly honest with anxious patients about what it is going to feel like. Anxiety will only worsen if you downplay the situation and the patient does not feel like they can trust your descriptions of what is going on or what you are doing to them any longer. When it comes to explaining, also remember that the more you explain the more knowledge you give anxious patients to be proactive in their own health, and knowledge is health power!
Take your time
Take your time with everything that you do around an anxious patient. You do not want to rush around someone who is already feeling overwhelming emotions about “not being ready” or “not wanting” to go through with being in your care. The slower you move, the more you explain, and the more you make skills and communication with them a priority the calmer and smoother the experience will be for the anxious patient. In addition, take your time preparing your materials before you go into the room to complete any skill or do an assessment. If you come unprepared and have to leave mid-way through a procedure you are losing trust with them and diminishing the nurse and patient relationship. You are also going to increase anxiety this way, because the patient will not know if you know what you are doing. They are trusting that they are in good hands, and you have to take your time to ensure that you don’t wrinkle their idea of good care on your watch.
Ask questions
It is important to ask questions when dealing with anxious patients in a number of ways. It is important to ask questions about the care they expect to have, as well as anything that might disrupt care. To calm anxiety between the nurse and patient be sure to ask about anything that they would refuse, and why. It may be religion, personal beliefs, medical history, etc., but if there is anything they do not want when it comes to care or cannot have you need to know well before you bring it up in a care plan. It is important to ask questions for the anxious patients that consider what their expectations are, too. If they have an idea of what the visit is going to look like and you stray from that path or make them uncomfortable that will enhance anxiety. By asking questions upfront and knowing exactly how they feel about different types of care the more equipped you will be when it comes to incorporating that care.
Use compassion
This is the very staple and foundation of nursing, so this one should come very easily and second nature to most nurses. However, when dealing with anxious patients it is very important that we are overly sensitive and compassionate with their fears. What may seem small to one person could bring on a full-on anxiety and panic attack for another. Each person, especially when considering individual experiences and environments during the upbringing, receives patient care and illness/injury differently. If we are very aware of our behaviors and words towards the anxious patient, we will be able to improve their experience through showing them compassion. Kindness and understanding, even for things we may not comprehend or be able to understand, shows them that we care and that they can trust us—both of which are very important when dealing with anxious patients. It is not our job to be judgmental or to pretend. If we can operate with extra compassion in all that we do around someone who is uncomfortable around us, we will make everything easier.
The anxious patient is a complex, multi-faceted patient that brings new challenges and welcomed complexity to our everyday nurse and patient relationship. Hopefully, by using these four tools, we can combat some of the emotional stress and anxiety that being under nursing care can cause a person. It is our job to ensure the most positive experience for everyone that we meet. If we can ease the discomfort, we can impact a large part of the entire care plan success. We can make a huge difference in the lives of those around us, and we can prove how valuable the care of nurse has always been and will always be.