Every word you use can affect your patients’ recovery. That is the power of communication in nursing! It directly affects your relationship to the people around you.
Nurses who earn an advanced degree, such as a BSN, learn the communication skills that are necessary to help patients recover, making this degree very important. While there is always a learning curve once a nurse enters the workforce, this degree makes the transition much smoother and, therefore, benefits patients greatly. Nurses can also focus on a singular area of care while earning their degree, making them experts in a particular field.
Just three words, a short phrase, heard from an ICU nurse that changed my friend’s well-being as she lay in an ICU bed. In fact, it is the only phrase my friend remembers from her entire hospital stay after having brain surgery to remove a tumor.
She was experiencing nausea, a sick feeling, and needing and wanting nursing care, direction and guidance from hospital staff. And three powerful words spoken from a nursing professional, were heard loudly and clearly so my friend could focus on the way she wanted to feel: “Fine that is”.
She wanted to feel normal. She wanted to feel comfortable. She wanted to eat and drink again. She wanted to let go of the queasy feeling and experience energy and vigor again. How was she going to do this with the pangs of nausea she was experiencing lying in the ICU bed?
The remedy was words. Good communication in nursing guided her brain to focus her mind on what she wanted. “Tell me what to do to feel better? I want to feel better,” she asked for guidance. Those three words, “mind over matter,” said in a gentle, compassionate way as a nurse, made all the difference in relieving my friend of the discomfort. Her deliberate focus of her mind over the situation made her feel relief. She guided her thoughts and her body into a feeling of peace, tranquility and feeling better and better.
This story of nursing communication is such a clear illustration of how powerful our words are in guiding others toward recovery, healing, well-being and comfort. We receive the messages into our subconscious and conscious minds and they make all the difference in our well-being journey.
I remember a patient telling me that the doctor told her she had seven months to live. I remember another patient telling me that the doctor said after having a stroke, the recovery would encompass a year of progress and no more. That of course was before we knew how flexible and amazing the brain really is. Yet personal motivation is the real life force in all of this. And the journey can take people along a positive road where little bits of progress influence the comeback.
This journey can also motivate us to progress to the level of what health care professionals have told us is possible or probable. They are the authority and they know what will happen because they have seen this before with others. They are the experts. Over and over again I hear the stories of recovery and I wonder why? Then I hear something in common with their experiences. The revelation is this: what was the person thinking, what were the messages being told to the patient, and what were they paying attention to? These are the questions we need to ask ourselves in whatever health care organization you work in. What messages are being conveyed?
In nursing communication, the power of words, especially in health care when people are vulnerable and afraid, needs to be deliberately kind, caring and comforting. Our remedy needs to be more than the procedures and the medicine. In patient care, our remedy needs to be in our messages too.
Our messages can bring hope and comfort or they can bring fear and pain. We can convey the same information in two different ways and convey two entirely different messages.
Are your messages conveying hope or fear? Words are powerful. I believe communication in nursing needs to intentionally use the positive, comforting, compassionate, words to guide patients in the way they want to feel. This is one story of how one nurse’s words had a positive effect on the patient’s recovery.
Spreading positive messages through communication in nursing will result in positive results even for those needing comfort from pain.
Have you ever experienced the healing power of words in your hospital? Leave a comment below, I’d love to hear from you!