The document discusses the components of the nurse-client relationship. It identifies five key components: trust, respect, professional intimacy, empathy, and power. Trust and respect are essential as the client is vulnerable and it is important nurses keep promises and recognize the client's dignity. Professional intimacy involves both physical and psychological closeness that is part of providing care. Empathy requires understanding the client's perspective while maintaining emotional distance. The relationship involves an imbalance of power that nurses must use appropriately to partner with clients.
The document discusses the components of the nurse-client relationship. It identifies five key components: trust, respect, professional intimacy, empathy, and power. Trust and respect are essential as the client is vulnerable and it is important nurses keep promises and recognize the client's dignity. Professional intimacy involves both physical and psychological closeness that is part of providing care. Empathy requires understanding the client's perspective while maintaining emotional distance. The relationship involves an imbalance of power that nurses must use appropriately to partner with clients.
The document discusses the components of the nurse-client relationship. It identifies five key components: trust, respect, professional intimacy, empathy, and power. Trust and respect are essential as the client is vulnerable and it is important nurses keep promises and recognize the client's dignity. Professional intimacy involves both physical and psychological closeness that is part of providing care. Empathy requires understanding the client's perspective while maintaining emotional distance. The relationship involves an imbalance of power that nurses must use appropriately to partner with clients.
The document discusses the components of the nurse-client relationship. It identifies five key components: trust, respect, professional intimacy, empathy, and power. Trust and respect are essential as the client is vulnerable and it is important nurses keep promises and recognize the client's dignity. Professional intimacy involves both physical and psychological closeness that is part of providing care. Empathy requires understanding the client's perspective while maintaining emotional distance. The relationship involves an imbalance of power that nurses must use appropriately to partner with clients.
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Introduction
At the core of nursing is the therapeutic nurse-client relationship. The
nurse establishes and maintains this key relationship by using nursing knowledge and skills, as well as applying caring attitudes and behaviours. Therapeutic nursing services contribute to the clientshealth and wellbeing. The relationship is based on trust, respect, empathy and professional intimacy, and requires appropriate use of the power inherent in the care providers role.
Components of the nurse-client relationship
There are five components to the nurse-client relationship: Regardless of the context, length of interaction and whether a nurse is the primary or secondary care provider, these components are always present Trust- Trust is critical in the nurse-client relationship because the client is in a vulnerable position.3 Initially, trust in a relationship is fragile, so its especially important that a nurse keep promises to a client. If trust is breached, it becomes difficult to re-establish. Respect- Respect is the recognition of the inherent dignity, worth and uniqueness of every individual, regardless of socio-economic status, personal attributes and the nature of the health problem.5 professional intimacy- Professional intimacy is inherent in the type of care and services that nurses provide. It may relate to the physical activities, such as bathing, that nurses perform for, and with, the client that create closeness. Professional intimacy can also involve psychological, spiritual and social elements that are identified in the plan of care. Access to the clients personal information, within the meaning of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, also contributes to professional intimacy. Empathy Empathy is the expression of understanding, validating and resonating with themeaning that the health care experience holds for the client. In nursing, empathy includes appropriate emotional distance from the client to ensure objectivity and an appropriate professional response. Power. The nurse-client relationship is one of unequal power. Although the nurse may not immediately perceive it, the nurse has more power than the client. The nurse has more authority and influence in the health care system, specialized knowledge, access to privileged information, and the ability to advocate for the client and the clients ignificant others The appropriate use of power, in a caring manner, enables the nurse to partner with the client to meet the clients needs. A misuse of power is considered abuse in this practice standard. Abuse. Abuse means the misuse of the power imbalance intrinsic in the nurse-client relationship. It can also mean the nurse betraying the clients trust, or violating the respect or professional intimacy
inherent in the relationship, when the nurse knew, or ought to have known, the action could cause, or could be reasonably expected to cause, physical, emotional or spiritual harm to the client. Abuse may be verbal, emotional, physical, sexual, financial or take the form of neglect. The intent of the nurse does not justify a misuse of power within the nurse-client relationship. For behaviours considered abusive, refer to Appendix A on page 16. Boundary. A boundary in the nurse-client relationship is the point at which the relationship changes from professional and therapeutic to unprofessional and personal. Crossing a boundary means that the care provider is misusing the power in the relationship to meet her/his personal needs, rather than the needs of the client, or behaving in an unprofessional manner with the client.8 The misuse of power does not have to be intentional to be considered a boundary crossing. Client. A client may be an individual, family, group or community. Client-centred care. In this approach, a client is viewed as a whole person. Client-centred care involves advocacy, empowerment and respect for the clients autonomy, voice, selfdetermination and participation in decision-making.9 It is not merely about delivering services where the client is located. Culture. Culture refers to the shared and learned values, beliefs, norms and ways of life of an individual or a group. It influences thinking, decisions and actions.10 Psychotherapeutic relationship. A psychotherapeutic relationship involves planned and structured psychological, psychosocial and/or interpersonal interventions aimed at influencing a behaviour, mood and/or the emotional reactions to different stimuli.11 Significant other. A significant other may include, but is not limited to, the person who a client identifies as the most important in his/her life. It could be a spouse, partner, parent, child, sibling or friend. meaning that the health care experience holds for the client. In nursing, empathy includes appropriate emotional distance from the client to ensure objectivity and an appropriate professional response.6 Power. The nurse-client relationship is one of unequal power. Although the nurse may not immediately perceive it, the nurse has more power than the client. The nurse has more authority and influence in the health care system, specialized knowledge, access to privileged information, and the ability to advocate for the client and the clients significant others.7 The appropriate use of power, in a caring manner, enables the nurse to partner with the client to meet the clients needs. A misuse of power is considered abuse. Therapeutic Nurse-Client Relationship, Revised 2006 includes four standard statements with indicators that describe a nurses accountabilities in the nurse client relationship. Use the decision tree on page 11 to determine whether an activity or behaviour is appropriate within the context of the nurse-client relationship.
