How to Write Nursing Reflective Essay?

 

Introduction

In nursing, a reflective essay is referred to the presentation of a comprehensive concept of a detailed overview of thoughts based on own knowledge, perceptions, beliefs, and experiences. It is generally described as a nursing essay where a lot of own thinking is involved to present information regarding the topic. In a nursing reflective essay, the feelings of the nurses in care or other surroundings are to be shared honestly. The nursing reflective essays are generally written to allow the nurse to analyze their strength and limitation in a situation. It helps them to understand the aspects to be further improved in delivering better care in similar situations in the future. The nursing reflective essay is usually written following different reflective tools and models of nursing. However, I am going to inform the general way in which any nursing reflection is to be written.

Steps to writing a nursing reflective essay

1. The initial step of writing a nursing reflective essay is beginning writing with a simplified yet concise introduction. This is because it helps in the presentation of the core purpose of the essay in a clarified manner for the readers to know what they are expected to get from reading the content.

As a writer, you are to ensure that you do not include too much information in the introduction that may divert the reader from the key topic. The presentation of a simple introduction in the reflective essay or other assists to keep the curiosity of the reader inclined to read the topic.

2. The next step is ensuring the reflective essay contains personal thoughts of you as a nurse for the reader so that they can understand what you were feeling during the incident you are describing to reflect. This is important as it helps you to make the readers sympathize with you.

3. The other aspect to be considered while reflecting is informing the feelings of the patients in care regarding your support from your view to lead the readers to understand the patient’s context from your perspective to more specifically determine the reason behind the action performed by you and the patients.

4. In the essay, you are to reflect on what you have gone through during the situation being described. This is to present your experiences at work beyond feelings. It is important to make the readers walk through your path to determine the way the incident of care is executed by you. Thereafter, you are required to assess and evaluate the nursing assignment or reflection on the experience shared by you as a nurse. This is to highlight what you consider as your strength and weakness along with the reason you think in such a way. It is your responsibility to also mention the way your identified weaknesses are to be resolved by you to let the readers understand that you intend to improve.

5. The reflection is required to end on a happy note to let the reader feel they have learned something from your experience. In a reflective essay, you are required to set a hopeful mindset for the reader to make them realize how they can also improve by learning from your experience.

Now, I am going to mention one of the nursing models that is often used in writing a reflective essay in nursing so that you can understand the way the structure of the essay to be made.

Gibb’s Reflective Cycle:

1. The reflective cycle is most commonly used by nurses in creating a reflective essay because it provides systematic steps with well-description regarding the way to present a reflection. According to the model, the first step in writing a nursing reflective essay is describing what happened. In writing the description, no judgment is to be made and simple words are to be used to indicate the situation. The description for the reflection is to be written without any form of manipulation and is required to mention what happened exactly along with what other people did in the situation, the outcome of the situation, and whether you as the narrator were present in the situation and others.

2. The second step is presenting your feelings about the situation. In this part, you are required to mention how you felt and your emotional condition before, during, and after the situation. You are also required to describe the feelings of other people in the situation and the emotion shown by them. You are required to explain how different people in the situation reacted before its occurrence and currently.

3. In the next step of evaluation, you are required to determine what was good and bad regarding the experience. You are to mention by citing an example from the described event to relate the good things that happened you are mentioning the reflection along with the bad things. The positive and negative contributions of you and other people in the situation are also to be described.

4. In the analysis stage, you are required to be critical and mention the reason behind why the determined things did well or badly. The analysis phase mainly provides you as the reflector the chance to make sense of what you have described as happened in the certain situation that you are reflecting on in the essay. In this stage, you have the opportunity to present the meaning of the things that happened.

Conclusion

In the conclusion section, you are required to summarise key points from the essay. Here, you are required to mention and highlight what you have learned from the experience and the outcomes faced by you. In this section, you are required to highlight facts to inform the readers of the way the situation could have been positively managed by others. Moreover, a summary of the personal positive and negative skills is to be presented in this section.