NSG2ANB : Bachelor Of Nursing Assignment
Question:
Answer:
Should a person living with dementia be involved in decision making regarding their healthcare?
Part 2-advantages
Dementia is a medical condition that results in loss of cognitive functions such as thinking, remembering, and reasoning. People with dementia have a major role to play in their lives when it comes to making decisions regarding their healthcare (Holroyd-Leduc et al., 2016). The major advantages of involving a person with dementia be involved in decision making regarding their healthcare include; it helps in respecting a person values and wishes. Persons with dementia have a difficult time with their cognitive function. However, allowing them to make decisions will help in respecting their wishes (Lord, Livingston & Cooper, 2015). This may be crucial in helping the patient to have control over their life still.
Secondly, involving a person living with dementia in decision making helps in planning for the future. By discussing personal values and their health conditions, it will be easier for the patient to plan for future activities. With this, they will be able to determine the type of health care services they will need and the medication to be using. While the patient is able to talk, the patient can complete legal paperwork to ensure that the wishes are recorded.
Additionally, there will be a possibility of the patient adjusting to changing abilities (Miller, Whitlatch & Lyons, 2016). As an illustration, with the patient decisions, there will be a variety of options that they can choose. Furthermore, it will be possible for their facial expressions to be read. As a result, this will make them more involved in the type of their healthcare. This is also an opportunity for the person with dementia to assess his/her abilities about the personal life choices regarding their healthcare.
Part 3-disadvantages
In life, people always want to make their life decision. However, when it comes to people with dementia, involving them in decisions regarding their healthcare is risky. This is because, with the loss of their cognitive functions such as thinking remembering and thinking, it may be challenging making the right decisions (Fetherstonhaugh, Tarzia, Bauer, Nay & Beattie, 2016). This means that there are numerous disadvantages of involving dementia patients in decision making regarding their healthcare. A person with dementia will be making decisions without knowing that they had made a different decision from the previous one. From this, it is clear that dementia patients are always in a state of confusion.
In most cases, they are always forced to do something such as taking drugs, feeding and cleaning themselves. This is a tiresome exercise. With this state of mind, allowing them to participate in decisions regarding their health will be pointless and unproductive (Poole et al., 2018). Proper care will need the assistance of a professional caregiver such as a nurse who will be able to understand. From the above discussion, a person with dementia lacks memory of previous activities. Therefore, in some cases, they won’t be in a position to remember specific actions after some period.
Consequently, when such patients are involved in decision making regarding their health care, the costs involved will be high (Sinclair, Bucks & Blake, 2018). As an illustration, there will be a waste of time and resources. When the patient says a particular decision today, there will be a different decision subsequently. Without a professional caregiver to make a stand regarding health care decisions, it will be a waste of time and resources.
References:
Fetherstonhaugh, D., Tarzia, L., Bauer, M., Nay, R., & Beattie, E. (2016). “The Red Dress or the Blue?” How Do Staff Perceive That They Support Decision Making for People With Dementia Living in Residential Aged Care Facilities? Journal of Applied Gerontology, 35(2), 209-226.
Holroyd-Leduc, J., Resin, J., Ashley, L., Barwich, D., Elliott, J., Huras, P., … & Pullman, D. (2016). Giving voice to older adults living with frailty and their family caregivers: engagement of older adults living with frailty in research, health care decision making, and in health policy. Research involvement and engagement, 2(1), 23.
Lord, K., Livingston, G., & Cooper, C. (2015). A systematic review of barriers and facilitators to and interventions for proxy decision-making by family carers of people with dementia. International Psychogeriatrics, 27(8), 1301-1312.
Miller, L. M., Whitlatch, C. J., & Lyons, K. S. (2016). Shared decision-making in dementia: a review of patient and family carer involvement. Dementia, 15(5), 1141-1157.
Poole, M., Bamford, C., McLellan, E., Lee, R. P., Exley, C., Hughes, J. C., … & Robinson, L. (2018). End-of-life care: A qualitative study comparing the views of people with dementia and family carers. Palliative medicine, 32(3), 631-642.
Sinclair, C., Bucks, R. S., & Blake, M. (2018). ‘We’ve always thought of one another’: relational perspectives on autonomy and decision-making among people with dementia and their family carers. In Dementia as Social Experience (pp. 130-145). Routledge.
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