LPD 3 Summative Assessment
Title of Assessment:
Identify ONE area of interest which you feel you need to develop within your nursing practice. This area of improvement must relate to your clinical practice. It must be appropriate for a third year student nurse. Critically analyse at least 2 up to date research studies that relate to your specific area of development, ensuring you also use many other sources of evidence to support your critical analysis. Critically reflect on what you have learnt from the evidence in relation to your nursing practice. Critically reflect on how you will improve your practice as a THIRD YEAR student nurse in relation to the evidence you have critically analyzed.
Note: The area of improvement should NOT be based on the following topics: Assertiveness, Delegation, Decision making and prioritizing, Leadership, managing difficult conversations, communication, professional identity, SBAR or dealing with the hierarchical structure within an organization. This is because these topics are being covered in depth in the other Year 3 modules.
Assessment Requirements:
Please submit using the summative template which is found under the assessment portal on the module site.
Introduction (approx. 200 words)
To be written in the 3rd person
Please state what your essay is going to include (so the aim of the essay). The introduction needs to highlight your area of improvement. You also need to write one sentence where you identify which reflective model you have used to help you critically reflect for this essay. (Please remember in this essay you DO NOT use a reflective model as a format for the essay. So you DO NOT structure it around a reflective model by writing a What section, So what section, Now what section but you follow the set framework highlighted here in the guidelines so Introduction, identify specific learning need, critical analysis, critical reflection).
Identify ONE area of interest which you feel you need to develop your nursing practice. (approx. 400 words)
To be written in the 1st person
Please critically reflect on how you identified a gap in your knowledge /practice and found a specific area of improvement. Please then critically reflect how your ONE specific learning need has limited your practice as a student nurse. This specific area of improvement can be the same as your formative assignment or you can change it.
It is essential that your area of interest is appropriate for a third year student nurse (so it should be challenging you rather than an improvement which you met in the first year and are just repeating). Please write this section in the first person as you are writing about yourself.
It is expected that you would use relevant, up to date evidence to support each statement you make.
Critically analyze at least 2 up to date research studies that relate to your learning need. Critically analyze other evidence that enhances your knowledge about your specific learning need. (approx. 1800)
To be written in the 3rd person
Critical analysis contains two steps.
Step One (400 words suggested – 200 words per article)
You need to briefly identify the key findings of each specific study, which should generally not take more than a few sentences each. You then need to concisely analyse an aspect of the study to identify it was valid, reliable, trustworthy or ethically robust.
Critically analyse these two articles:
- Souza, S. C. R. & Arcuri, M. A. E. (2014). Communication strategies of the nursing team in the aphasia after cerebrovascular accident. Revista da Escola de Enfermagem 48 (2), 288- 293. DOI: 10.1590 / S0080-6234201400002000014
- Morris, A. M., Clayman, L. M., Petets, . J. K., Leppin, L. A. & LeBlanc, A. (2015). Patient-centered communication strategies for patients with aphasia: Discrepancies between what patients want and what physicians do. Disability and Health Journal, 8(2), 208-215. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dhjo.2014.09.007
N.B: You should be selecting 2 primary studies to critique.
Step Two (1400 words suggested)
You then need to compare and contrast the findings of the 2 selected studies with a range of other studies and explore the topic, discuss the relevance of the findings and the available literature to clinical practice. You should look at policies and other evidence including literature reviews and critically analyse why there is agreement or disagreement between the evidence you have found.
The most important aspect is that you have the most relevant and most up to date evidence. If you have been found to use old evidence and we can find much more up to date evidence then your essay is out of date and is not evidence based.
Critically reflect how you will attempt to change or improve your practice as a result of this learning. (approx. 400)
To be written in the 1st person
From the extensive reading you have undertaken (up to date policies, CQC reports, research studies, Acts, educational articles) please critically reflect on the specific findings of the evidence and critically reflect how you might embed this practice in your future practice. Please critically reflect on how you feel this will enhance your practice and evidence base and the care you give as a student nurse.
Critical reflection involves demonstrating self-awareness in relation to your need and the evidence you have read. You need to demonstrate understanding of how the evidence supports or challenges how you have previously been nursing.
It is expected that you would use relevant, up to date evidence to support each statement you make.
Conclusion (approx. 200 words)
To be written in the 3rd person
Please write a clear conclusion identifying the key points you have made about changes to your practice as a nurse in relation to your specific learning need. It is expected that you would use relevant, up to date evidence to support each statement you make.
Please ensure you have a complete and correct reference list according to the School of Health and Social Work Referencing Handbook 2019/2020 (http://academic-skills.health.herts.ac.uk/referencing/). There may have been changes in the Referencing Handbook since last year so please ensure you incorporate those changes.
