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The article discusses how nurses can use the Outcomes Assessment and Information Set (OASIS) to assess diabetes patients referred to home care. The assessment involves identifying diabetes mellitus as type I or type II, and to identify long-term insulin therapy if the patient is taking insulin. Risk factors such as obesity and smoking have to be assessed, as they can cause complications in diabetic patients.

The article discusses the use of the Outcome and Assessment Information Set (OASIS) in providing care to stroke patients during recovery at home. It is stated that the OASIS helps the nurse perform an assessment to develop a plan of care, and it is also helpful in home health performance improvement. It discusses the OASIS assessments performed by a nurse in a 65-year-old stroke patient that included the neurological, cardiovascular, skin, and the nutritional assessments.

Nurses from the Inova Health System, an integrated care system in northern Virginia, used the Future Search process to create an action plan for their future practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Culture-sensitive (CS) and patient-centered (PC) care are considered essential to achieve high-quality equitable care. The purpose of this study was to determine how expert nurses incorporate CS/PC care into their assessment and care planning practices, especially for culturally diverse and marginalized patients., Methodology: Using a qualitative, descriptive design, we conducted a focus group at the October 2019 Transcultural Nursing Society Conference. Participants ( n = 9) discussed how they instilled cultural sensitivity and patient-centeredness into their assessment and care planning skills., Results: Participants revealed attitudes, knowledge, and skills associated with CS/PC assessment and care planning. They also identified specific strategies for translating CS/PC theory into assessment and care planning practices., Discussion: Three principles and many pragmatic strategies for incorporating CS/PC care into daily practice emerged from the data. Nurses may find these principles and strategies helpful in integrating CS/PC care into their daily care of patients in busy clinical settings.

Background: Hospital-acquired pressure injuries strain organizational resources and negatively impact the quality of life of affected patients. However, early detection of pressure injuries is limited due to challenges with visual assessment, particularly in individuals with dark skin., Purpose: The purpose of this systematic review was to determine whether sufficient research evidence exists to support the use of bedside technologies for early detection of pressure injures, which is inclusive of pressure-related blanchable erythema (PrBE), pressure-related nonblanchable erythema (PrNBE), and deep tissue pressure injury (DTPI)., Search Question: What available bedside technologies enhance the early detection of pressure injuries?, Methods: A systematic search of Medline, CINAHL, Web of Science, and Cochrane databases was executed. Quantitative studies were included that examined whether accessible technologies could indicate the presence of PrBE, PrNBE, and DTPI. The quality of the research was evaluated using the Johns Hopkins Nursing Evidence-Based Practice Rating Scale., Findings: We identified 18 eligible studies that represented a variety of technologies, including ultrasound (n = 5), thermography (n = 7), subepidermal moisture (SEM) measurement (n = 5), reflectance spectrometry (n = 2), and laser Doppler (n = 1). The methodological rigor in study quality was variable. Subepidermal moisture measurement provided the most consistent findings in the early detection of pressure injury., Conclusions: Objective methods that provide accurate and timely assessment of DTPIs augment early implementation of optimal prevention and treatment measures. Evidence identified in this systematic review supports the use of SEM measurement devices as effective tools for early pressure injury detection. However, more research in the field of technology-enhanced, pressure injury detection is needed to support the use of existing and emerging devices.

: This article examines the nature of implicit, or unconscious, bias and how such bias develops. It describes the ways that implicit bias among health care providers can contribute to health care disparities and discusses strategies nurses can use to recognize and mitigate any biases they may have so that all patients receive respectful and equitable care-regardless of their race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identification, socioeconomic status, disabilities, stigmatized diagnoses, or any characteristic that distinguishes them from societal norms.

Introduction: Though extensive evidence demonstrates that U.S. minority patients suffer health care disparities, the incidence of disparities among the 3.3 million adult patients receiving skilled intermittent home health care services annually is unclear. The purpose of this systematic review is to determine the relationship of race/ethnicity on home health care patient outcomes., Methodology: PRISMA guidelines were used to perform a systematic search of the literature within the CINHAL, Medline, and Web of Science databases. Search terms included variations on the terms: home health, minority race/ethnicity, and patient outcomes. Included studies evaluated adult patient outcomes to intermittent skilled home health care services from Medicare-certified agencies using federally defined race/ethnicity categories. Research quality was evaluated using the Johns Hopkins Evidence Based Practice Grading Scale., Results: Seven studies were identified in the search. All studies were of good-to-high quality with the majority having large samples. All seven found a significant difference in patient outcomes related to race/ethnicity. Specifically, minority patients had more adverse events, less improvement in functional outcomes, and worse patient experiences when compared with majority patients., Conclusion: Home health care disparities exist and efforts should be made to provide culturally and linguistically appropriate care to all patients.

Overview: Minority patients are at high risk for poor pain outcomes. When patients belong to a culture or speak a language that's different from that of their health care provider, the provider faces additional challenges in successfully assessing and managing the patients' pain. This article describes how and why culture affects both patients and nurses. It also discusses why members of cultural minority groups frequently receive suboptimal pain management and how nurses can improve patients' pain outcomes by using culturally sensitive assessments and providing culturally comfortable care.

Objective: To determine factors related to residents' self-reported skill level for the skin cancer examination (SCE)., Design: Survey of residents in November 2003., Setting: Four US residency programs., Participants: Medical residents in family medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, and internal medicine and specialists., Main Outcome Measure: Proportion of residents reporting their current skill level for the performance of the SCE., Results: Of 454 surveys distributed, 342 residents completed the survey (75.3% response rate). Clinical training for the SCE during residency was infrequent. During residency, 75.8% were never trained in the SCE, 55.3% never observed an SCE, and 57.4% never practiced the examination. Only 15.9% of residents reported being skilled in the SCE. However, the conduct of 4 SCEs (or slightly more than 1 per each year of residency) was associated with manifold increases in self-reported skill levels., Conclusions: Information now collected from 7 medical schools and 4 residency programs underscores the need for more supervised opportunities to enable physicians in training to perform an SCE during routine patient examinations.

OASIS M0520 instructions indicate: If the patient is incontinent AT ALL-even occasional leaking-mark "Patient is incontinent." This article describes why "leaking" is incontinence, various causes of urinary incontinence, and what nurses should do when they discover their patients have this problem. By addressing incontinence in its early stages, the nurse may prevent the patient from developing debilitating incontinence.

Nurses from the Inova Health System, an integrated care system in northern Virginia, used the Future Search process to create an action plan for their future practice.