When nursing students start their educational journey, they often find themselves engaged in challenging and intense environments. It can be draining to continue education along with patient care and clinical experience. Because nursing students have to deal with their college nursing essays as well as their clinical experience is very tough to manage. They often neglect their health in this situation. In this chaos, it is important to understand the value of self-care.
What is Self Care?
Self-care is the practice of taking good, intentional, and comprehensive care of oneself. It entails ensuring that all of your needs—intellectual, emotional, physical, relational, and spiritual—are satisfied.
Occasionally, the emphasis on “self” might lead to the misunderstanding that self-care is selfish. Aren’t the other people in my life worth more to me? Furthermore, I should be concentrating on my patients first and foremost as a nurse.
Although these are valid concerns, nurses are not being selfish when they take care of themselves. Instead, it is a means of protecting yourself and freeing up more energy for other people in your personal and professional life.
Why is Self Care Important In Nursing?
Being a nurse is an honourable career that demands perseverance, compassion, and commitment. Nursing students are essential to patients’ health because they will eventually work as healthcare professionals. But taking care of other people shouldn’t come at the cost of self-neglect. This is why taking care of oneself is important:
High-quality patient care: It requires nurses to take care of themselves in order to give patients the best care possible. The Hospital for Special Surgery’s Chief Nursing Officer, Jennifer A. O’Neill, highlights the importance of self-care and says it’s not a luxury. Nurses may provide better care for their patients when they put their health first.
Preventing Burnout: Nurses sometimes have rigorous schedules and extended work hours. Mental tiredness, lack of focus, and forgetfulness can result from burnout. Prioritizing self-care can lessen the detrimental effects of burnout on nurses and the standard of care they provide.
Emotional Resilience: Observing illness, suffering, and grief presents emotional hurdles for nursing students. By taking care of themselves, individuals can develop emotional resilience, which makes it easier for them to handle stress and keep their mental health.
Physical Well-Being: Adequate self-care entails physical facets like physical activity, diet, and relaxation. A nurse in good health is more capable of managing the physical demands of her job.
Safety and Quality: Patient safety and care quality both increase when nurses give self-care priority. A nurse who is emotionally stable and gets enough sleep is better able to make clinical decisions and deliver safer care.
Keep in mind that, as nursing students, you are studying both the art and the science of care. Making self-care a priority will enable you to pour from the full cup and offer people skilled and sensitive care who depend on you.
What Is Burnout and How Does It Happen?
Burnout is more likely to occur among nurses who do not practice self-care, and the coronavirus epidemic in recent years has made burnout even more likely. Nurses put their health at risk by working longer shifts and tending to patients who were afflicted with the virus, all while managing widespread pain and anxiety.
In addition to that, it’s critical to know what burnout is. “A state of physical or emotional exhaustion that also involves a sense of reduced accomplishment and loss of personal identity”.
How Does Burnout Affect Nurses?
Excessive stress from your workload, a lack of interest in your nursing education or work hours, mental exhaustion, or another factor altogether are common signs of burnout. Although an unpleasant work environment or an excessive workload are the main reasons for burnout, specific factors vary from nurse to nurse and student to student.
Burnout in nursing students is often caused by the following:
- Coursework that is physically and emotionally taxing
- Unrealistic demands made by outside sources
- Perfectionism among students
- Extended working hours or irregular clinical shifts
- Having a limited amount of time to learn a lot of challenging coursework
- Not getting enough sleep
- Tense atmosphere in a classroom or clinic
One helpful first step in recovering from burnout is figuring out what exactly is causing it. The next steps are to identify its sources and symptoms, then come up with ways to lessen or perhaps get rid of it.
Techniques for Nursing Students to Overcome Burnout
These tried-and-true methods can assist you in overcoming nursing burnout symptoms, if you are encountering any of them. They function by making minor adjustments to your life that have a significant effect on your mood. Many of them also serve as safeguards against burnout in the future. While not entirely, this list offers some of the finest strategies for dealing with and overcoming burnout.
Pay attention to self-care
Self-care is treating yourself to something enjoyable or calming, such as watching your favourite movie or keeping a notebook. Discover little ways to make yourself happy every day, whether it’s streaming Netflix or getting a coffee.
Give diet and exercise top priority
Your mood and general state of well-being are greatly influenced by your diet and exercise habits. It’s not necessary to take up a challenging CrossFit class or adopt a fully vegan diet, however these options are acceptable if they align with your interests. Simple changes like eating an apple instead of a candy bar during your work break or walking the longer route to your next class rather than rushing there to check your phone can make a big difference in your current eating and exercise habits.If you are busy and can’t manage to go gym then you can do small exercises as mini workouts greatly impact on students physical and mental health.
Engage in community service
The people in your neighborhood are here to help. Permit them. We frequently believe that we must handle mental health issues on our own. But the people you love can make you feel less alone and provide you some much-needed support and affection.
Recognize what causes you trouble
Anxiety is frequently brought on by specific situations, such as working an understaffed shift or staying up late to complete an assignment. Certain triggers can be eliminated by practicing better time management techniques or by discussing assignment extensions with your professor. You frequently have no control over others. Use self-care methods to better prepare yourself to handle triggers that you are unable to control.
Seek assistance when required
Having a confidant with whom to discuss your burnout can have a profound impact. Although a close friend or family member might play this role, a licensed therapist offers an unbiased resource for managing burnout.
Establish limits
Establishing boundaries at work and school might be as simple as refusing to take on additional shifts when you’re tired or skipping the school email after a particular hour. Look for techniques to ensure that you take time apart from the most challenging things in your life.
Engage in meditation exercises
Meditation can help you stay connected to the present. Developing meditation can be accomplished in two ways: formally with exercises like breathwork or guided meditation, or informally with activities like appreciating your morning coffee or listing three things for which you are thankful when you’re feeling anxious.
Develop a skill to divide
Separating work and personal life might be crucial in relation to establishing limits. You can accomplish this by not reading emails relating to school while socializing with friends, or by engaging in a passion project without taking a peek at your phone. Distract yourself from work-related thoughts by viewing a movie or playing video games with close friends when you’re not at work.
Get enough rest
One essential but frequently disregarded component of mental wellness is sleep. Sleeping for seven or eight hours reduces the likelihood of burnout and stress. Make obtaining adequate sleep a priority, even if that means scheduling time in your calendar or using a timer to remind you when it’s time to go to bed. Getting enough sleep is the most effective approach to overcome burnout in the quickest length of time, if you can only focus on one.
Conclusion
In conclusion, self-care is an investment in the future health of nursing students and other healthcare professionals, not a luxury. Nurses contribute to a better, more compassionate healthcare system by taking care of themselves. Burnout in nursing school is real, but the benefits are also real. Remember why you chose to pursue one of the most honorable professions in the world. Stay focused on your main objectives, and let go of the things you cannot control.
