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The Gibbs Reflective Cycle: A Framework for Professional Development Study Guide

This guide provides an overview of the aging process, focusing on the physiological changes in various body systems, functional abilities (ADLs), cognitive function, and psychosocial adjustments. It emphasizes distinguishing normal aging from disease and outlines health promotion strategies and clinical risks relevant to older adults. Key topics include integumentary, cardiovascular, respiratory, gastrointestinal, and immune system changes, as well as cognitive assessments and psychosocial well-

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The Gibbs Reflective Cycle

Applying Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle

Gibbs Reflective Cycle Overview

Gibbs reflective cycle connects what has been learned from one experience with that of another to help learners clarify how learning is progressing.

  • Reflective cycles
  • Description
  • Feelings
  • Evaluation
  • Analysis
  • Conclusion
  • Action Plan
  • Reflective practice in nursing

Aging Well and Age-Related Changes

Aging Well and Age-Related Changes

Examine healthy aging from a holistic perspective, demographics of the older population, and potential pathological changes associated with aging.

  • demographics of the older population
  • gerontological care
  • healthy aging
  • theories on aging
  • pathological changes associated with aging
  • sensory alterations
  • prevention and health promotion
  • age-inclusive language
  • ageism
  • myths and stereotypes
  • developmental tasks for older persons
  • quality of life
  • community-based and institutional health care services

Assessing Physiological and Psychosocial Aging

Nursing assessment of the interrelationship between physical and psychosocial aspects of aging, including physiological changes, functional changes, and cognitive changes.

  • Nursing assessment
  • Physiological changes
  • Functional changes
  • Activities of daily living (ADLs)
  • Cognitive changes
  • Delirium
  • Dementia
  • Depression
  • Psychosocial changes
  • Health promotion and maintenance
  • Restorative care
  • Integumentary system changes
  • Vitamin D supplementation

Introduction to Health and Gerontology

Introduction to Health and Gerontology

An introduction to health and gerontology exploring health definitions, determinants of health, and strategies for health promotion and disease prevention.

  • Health definitions
  • Illness vs disease
  • Determinants of health
  • Health promotion
  • Disease prevention
  • Levels of prevention
  • Ottawa Charter strategies
  • Population health promotion model
  • Upstream vs downstream health
  • Gerontology nursing roles

Nursing Fundamentals: Communication Overview and Strategies

Nursing Fundamentals Communication Module

This module explores communication as the exchange of information through signs, symbols, speech, and behaviour, focusing on therapeutic communication and interventions for older persons.

  • Verbal and nonverbal communication
  • Therapeutic communication
  • Ageist attitudes
  • Reminiscence and life review
  • Communication impairments
  • Professional boundaries
  • Nurse-client relationships
  • Contextual factors influencing communication
  • Sensory and neurological function alterations

Nursing Documentation and Confidentiality Standards

Nursing Documentation and Confidentiality Standards

This module covers the purpose, importance, and guidelines for accurate documentation and the professional standards surrounding confidentiality in nursing care.

  • Nursing process
  • Purposes of medical records
  • High quality documentation criteria
  • Communication
  • Accountability
  • Security
  • Confidentiality
  • Professional standards
  • Legislation
  • Social media responsibility

Nursing Documentation Guidelines and Standards

Documentation in a health record serves as a confidential, permanent legal document containing information relevant to patient care, including assessment, planning, intervention, and evaluation.

  • Documentation Guidelines and Standards
  • Evidence-Based Documentation
  • Interdisciplinary Communication
  • Narrative Documentation
  • Problem-Oriented Medical Records
  • Charting by Exception
  • Case Management
  • Quality Documentation Guidelines
  • Nursing Process

Human Development and Developmental Theories

Human Development and Developmental Theories

An exploration of human development across the lifespan, including growth, development, types of aging, and various developmental theories.

  • Lifespan development approach
  • Types of aging
  • Fluid and crystallized intelligence
  • Memory
  • Health literacy
  • Growth vs development
  • Factors influencing growth and development
  • Developmental theories traditions
  • Organicism
  • Biophysical developmental theories
  • Gesell’s theory of maturational development
  • Maturation

Theories of Human Development

This content explores temperament, cognitive development theories, and moral development theories including the stages of reasoning and thinking processes.

  • Chess and Thomas’s Theory of Temperament Development
  • Temperament
  • Cognitive Development Theories
  • Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
  • Sensorimotor stage
  • Preoperational stage
  • Concrete operations stage
  • Formal operations stage
  • Moral Development Theories
  • Moral reasoning
  • Moral development
  • Piaget’s theory of moral development
  • Gilligan’s theory
  • Premoral stage
  • Conventional stage
  • Autonomous stage

Psychoanalytic and Psychosocial Development Theories

This module describes the development of personality, thinking, behaviour, and emotions through psychoanalytic and psychosocial theories.

  • Freud’s psychosexual theory
  • Id, ego, and superego
  • Bowlby’s attachment theory
  • Psychosocial model
  • Attachment and separation theory
  • Dynamic maturational model of attachment

Nursing Fundamentals: Hygiene, Mouth Care, and Feeding

Nursing Fundamentals: Hygiene and Nutrition

This content covers nursing fundamentals including bathing, grooming, mouth care, feeding, and monitoring intake and output to promote and preserve health.

  • Patient-centred Care
  • Safety Guidelines
  • Common Skin Problems
  • Risk Factors for Skin Impairment
  • Factors Influencing Hygiene
  • Cultural Considerations
  • Bathing Principles
  • Perineal Care
  • Hair Care
  • Mouth Care
  • Denture Care
  • Feeding and Nutrition
  • Aspiration Precautions
  • International Dysphagia Diet Levels
  • Monitoring Intake and Output

Medical Terminology Prefixes and Suffixes

Clinical Nursing Terminology Prefixes and Suffixes

An appendix listing medical prefixes and suffixes with their corresponding definitions for clinical nursing skills and techniques.

  • Prefixes
  • Suffixes
  • Medical Terminology
  • Combining Forms

Medical Prefixes and Suffixes Reference

A reference list of medical suffixes and their definitions including terms for conditions, processes, and instruments.

  • medical suffixes
  • medical terminology
  • definitions of medical terms

Infection Control, Hand Hygiene, and Standard Precautions

Infection Control and Standard Precautions

Explain how microorganisms are spread and the chain of transmission while applying appropriate standard precautions and hand hygiene practices.

  • Chain of infection
  • Medical asepsis
  • Surgical asepsis
  • Hand hygiene
  • Standard precautions
  • Transmission-based precautions
  • Personal protective equipment
  • Health care-associated infections
  • Cough etiquette

Standard and Transmission-Based Infection Control

Procedures for standard precautions involving body substances and transmission-based precautions including personal protective equipment.

  • Standard precautions
  • Body substances
  • Personal protective equipment
  • Hand hygiene
  • Transmission-based precautions
  • Airborne precautions
  • Contact precautions
  • Droplet precautions
  • Cross-contamination

Positioning, Range of Motion, and Pressure Ulcers

Positioning and Range of Motion

Principles for practice include patient positioning to maintain body alignment and range of motion activities to prevent contractures.

  • Body mechanics
  • Safe patient-handling techniques
  • Patient positioning
  • Body alignment
  • Positioning aids
  • Trochanter rolls
  • Prone
  • Supine
  • Lateral
  • Fowler’s position
  • Range of motion
  • Active range of motion
  • Passive range of motion
  • Active assisted range of motion
  • Flexion
  • Extension
  • Hyperextension
  • Dorsiflexion
  • Plantar flexion
  • Adduction

Staging Pressure Ulcers and Positioning

Staging of pressure ulcers and case studies regarding positioning, mobility, and range of motion.

  • Stage 1 non-blanchable erythema
  • Stage 2 partial-thickness skin loss
  • Stage 3 full-thickness skin loss
  • Stage 4 full-thickness skin and tissue loss
  • Decubitus ulcer
  • Tissue necrosis
  • Footdrop
  • Range of motion (ROM)

Bed Making and Body Mechanics Theory

Bed Making and Body Mechanics

Demonstrate how to make occupied, unoccupied and surgical beds while applying principles of infection control and good body mechanics when caring for clients.

  • Occupied bed
  • Unoccupied bed
  • Surgical bed
  • Infection control
  • Body mechanics
  • Musculoskeletal disorders
  • Patient environment assessment
  • Client comfort
  • Skin assessment
  • Safe handling techniques
  • Privacy
  • Pressure points

Introduction to Health, Gerontology, and Aging

Aging Trends, Wellness, and Healthy Aging

This module explores aging in Canada and global aging trends, definitions of health and wellness, and the principles of primary health care in gerontological nursing.

  • Aging in Canada
  • Gerontological Explosion
  • Global Aging
  • Health and Wellness
  • Determinants of Health
  • Primary Health Care Principles
  • Gerontological Nursing
  • Interprofessional Collaboration
  • Intersectoral Collaboration
  • Public Participation

Age-Related Changes in Body Systems

Age-Related Changes in Body Systems

Age-related changes involve the musculoskeletal, cardiovascular, and respiratory systems including sarcopenia, decreased cardiac output, and loss of elastic recoil.

  • Musculoskeletal system changes
  • Sarcopenia
  • Bone mineral density reduction
  • Body water distribution
  • Cardiac output decrease
  • Myocardial and blood vessel stiffening
  • Decreased arterial elasticity
  • Increased peripheral resistance
  • Venous thrombosis risk
  • Respiratory gas exchange inefficiency
  • Chest wall stiffening
  • Lung volume changes

Physiological Changes During Aging

This module details physiological changes in the renal, endocrine, reproductive, gastrointestinal, neurological, sensory, and immune systems of older adults.

  • Renal system changes
  • Endocrine system changes
  • Reproductive system changes
  • Gastrointestinal system changes
  • Neurological system changes
  • Sensory changes
  • Immune system changes
  • Oral health considerations
  • Vision and hearing changes

Experiences and Group Work with Older Persons

Communication and Group Work with Older Persons

Information regarding group work with older persons and communication with older persons with sensory impairments.

  • Group work with older persons
  • Institutional settings
  • Communication skills
  • Peer support
  • Communication with older persons with sensory impairments

Subjective and Objective Data Collection

Documentation and Confidentiality in Nursing

This module covers subjective data, objective data, and nursing documentation practices including point-of-care information systems and change-of-shift reports.

  • Subjective Data
  • Objective Data
  • Point-of-care information systems
  • Pain assessment charting
  • Vital signs documentation
  • Change-of-shift report
  • Continuity of care

Mechanistic, Contextual, and Dialecticism Developmental Theories

Human Development Theoretical Traditions

Developmental theories explore the mechanistic tradition, contextualism, and dialecticism to understand human development and nursing applications.

  • Mechanistic Tradition
  • Social learning theory
  • Contextualism
  • Bioecological theory
  • Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory
  • Microsystem
  • Mesosystem
  • Exosystem
  • Macrosystem
  • Dialecticism
  • Developmental health
  • Resilience theory
  • Protective processes
  • Vulnerability processes

Cognitive Assessment and Gerontological Nursing Care

Cognitive Assessment and Gerontological Nursing Care

Nurses promote health and well-being of older adults through cognitive assessment, person-centred care, and supporting family caregiving for people with cognitive decline.

  • Cognitive Assessment
  • Cognitive Impairment
  • Mini-Mental State Exam (MMSE)
  • Clock Drawing Test (CDT)
  • Person-Centred Care
  • Activities of Daily Living (ADLs)
  • Dementia
  • Family Caregiving
  • Environmental Alterations

Sensory Alterations and Communication Strategies

Sensory Alterations and Communication Nursing Knowledge

Nursing knowledge regarding sensory stimuli, sensory alterations, and communication considerations for older persons with sensory impairments.

  • Sensory stimuli
  • Sensory alterations
  • Sensory deprivation
  • Sensory overload
  • Visual impairment
  • Hearing impairment
  • Sensorineural hearing loss
  • Conductive hearing loss
  • Presbycusis
  • Cerumen impaction
  • Assistive devices
  • Cochlear implants
  • Tactile sensation
  • Communication considerations

Communicating with Older Adults with Neurological Disorders

Communication with older adults with neurological disorders involves addressing impaired verbal communication categories including reception, perception, and articulation.

  • Impaired verbal communication
  • Aphasia
  • Broca’s aphasia
  • Anomic aphasia
  • Global aphasia
  • Verbal apraxia
  • Dysarthria
  • Alternative and Augmentative Speech Aids
  • Communication techniques for aphasic individuals

Quality Documentation, Reporting, and Communication

Guidelines for Quality Documentation and Reporting

Quality documentation and reporting enhance efficient, safe, individualized patient care through complete, current, and organized records.

  • Quality documentation and reporting
  • Malpractice related to incorrect documentation
  • Handwritten documentation guidelines
  • Chronological documentation
  • Error correction in records
  • Admission nursing history form
  • Flow sheets and graphic records
  • Standardized care plans
  • Discharge summary forms
  • Electronic Health Record (EHR)
  • Electronic Medical Record (EMR)
  • Computerized medical record system

Documentation, Confidentiality, and Interprofessional Communication

This module covers privacy, confidentiality, and security mechanisms, multidisciplinary communication, and various documentation methods used within the health care team.

  • Privacy, Confidentiality, and Security Mechanisms
  • Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA)
  • Interprofessional Communication
  • Patient Records
  • Narrative Note
  • SOAP (subjective-objective-assessment-plan)
  • SBAR (situation-background-assessment-recommendation)
  • PIE (problem-intervention-evaluation)
  • Documentation in Long-Term Health Care
  • Incident Reports
  • Change-of-shift reports
  • Transfer of accountability

Documentation, Discharge Planning, and Confidentiality

Guidelines for change-of-shift reports, discharge summary reports, and maintaining patient confidentiality through HIPAA and PHIPA compliance.

  • Change-of-Shift Reports
  • Discharge Summary Report
  • Discharge Planning
  • Patient Confidentiality
  • Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
  • Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA)
  • Legal and Ethical Obligations
  • Breaking Confidentiality

Maslow's Hierarchy and Developmental Theories

Maslow's Hierarchy and Developmental Theories

A study of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and developmental theories to help nursing students determine and prioritize care of clients.

  • Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
  • Developmental theory
  • Prioritize care of clients

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