Quality Of Pediatric Nursing Paper

Words: 1536
Pages: 7

Improving the Quality of Pediatric Care in Nursing
Michele Flugel

6/16/2015

This paper will discuss how we are improving the quality of pediatric care in nursing, what the role of the professional nurse is and how it relates to Piaget's stages of cognitive development. It will also touch base on the current contributions to the improvements in the community for pediatric health care and how informatics and technology advanced the practice of pediatric nursing.

Pediatric nursing is the practice of nursing with children, youth, and their families throughout the medical field. This branch of nursing deals with the care of children from birth until eighteen years of age. Pediatric nursing includes health promotion, illness management,
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In the community today, vaccines for children are offered for free at local health departments. This is because at a point in time children were not being vaccinated due to the high cost of healthcare. Pediatricians are also providing more services in their offices allowing for less hospital visits for children (Dennis Z. Kuo, 2012). Childhood disease are much more understood, and nurses are making great efforts in teaching parents how to avoid illnesses for their children, hand-washing being one of the most effective. Treatments have also changed since the understanding of different diseases. Children are not as sick for as long and treatments are less invasive. Another improvement in pediatric healthcare in the community is the programs that are offered. Many states offer free or affordable insurance for children whose parents may not have insurance or have a low income(Thomas, 2014). Many states also offer programs such as WIC, Women Infants and Children, which starts before the baby is even born to ensure proper nutrition for the mother and the baby. WIC provides formula for the newborn or healthy food for the breast feeding mother. WIC uses the food pyramid to offer healthy foods to the child to assure adequate nutrition. There are also programs that offer children free school lunch, this ensures nutrition is adequate throughout their growth and development. Although the community provides essential programs for children and …show more content…
In pediatric nursing specifically, it has helped to prevent medication errors, ensure the safety of the child during procedures, and an increase patient compliance with follow up appointments. In pediatric nursing syringe pumps are used to administer IV antibiotics at a safe, slow and accurate rate that ensures the child will not get too much medicine too fast, or not enough medicine to be therapeutic to the child. Technology has allowed for doctors to be able to do procedures less invasively such as, using a CAT scan to guide them for a lumbar puncture so that a child only has to be stuck once instead of multiple times before hitting the right spot. Technology also allows for early detection of problems that may occur such as allowing us to do echos on a fetus still in the womb to detect heart defects before the baby is born. Electronic medical records are also very important in pediatric nursing as it allows for accurate records to be kept so double vaccines aren't given or double doses of meds that might cause harm to the child (Niemeier, 2011). Technology has also improved the follow up for pediatric nursing as some mothers do not want to take their immuno-compromised child to sit in a doctor office just for results of a test. These days the parent is able to go online and pull up test results from the comfort of their own home. Telephone, emails and apps on cells phones also allow for better planning and reminders