Nursing Checklists offer an organizing framework for the assessment of each body system or for approaching a certain task. Certain Nursing Checklists outline specific questions or points to consider when caring for patients with assistive devices. Nursing Tips help the reader to apply basic knowledge to real-life situations and offer hints and shortcuts useful to both new and experienced nurses. Nursing Alerts highlight serious or life-threatening signs or critical assessment findings that need immediate attention. Case Studies present realistic scenarios, offering opportunities for the reader to apply the chapter material, thereby encouraging extrapolation and intuitive thinking.
Case studies list normal and abnormal assessment findings in the context of a clinical scenario.
Each case study includes a sample patient history, physical assessment findings, and laboratory data in documentation format, emphasizing the nurse's responsibilities in correct charting. The case studies are written in abbreviated format to simulate real clinical documentation, and deliberately have different charting styles to reflect the wide variety of norms in actual clinical practice. Nursing diagnoses and nursing care plans are included in the Instructor's Resource Kit for each case study in the text. Competencies open each chapter and introduce the main areas targeted for mastery in each chapter, providing a checkpoint for study and tie-in to crucial assessment skills. Nursing Checklists concluding each chapter offer a conceptual framework for chapter review, highlighting main points.