Humanistic Nursing by Loretta T. Zderad (good short books TXT) 📕

A second reason offered by Trautman is the increased emphasis in nursing education on communication and verbal skills. A nurse with a talent for writing may be moved by a particular experience to share it. Thus, "the sensitive nurse-writer may use poetic expression to work through a problem, to muse about a detail, or to record a profound experience."[3]

Finally, she states that some nurses write poetry about aspects of their work that defy scientific analysis and cannot be easily contained in technical papers. In this, then, nurses' poetry goes beyond the personal satisfaction accompanying expression; it preserves a unique angular view of nursing's lived world and adds to our store of clinical wisdom. As Trautman concludes:

"Poetry has trailed the profession for many years, probably because nurses were not encouraged in creative writing of any kind. Today, however, I think that poetry leads the profession because most of it never loses sight of human needs—both nurses' and patients'. Our poets lend a clear and vital voice to our profession. They cite their experiences, emotions, beliefs, and awareness in lieu of a science-oriented bibliography. They appeal to our common sense but, more importantly to our hearts. They tell us to observe honestly and to feel. Above all, our poets tell us to believe in our observations and to trust in our feelings—for patients, for ourselves."[4]

Some elements or aspects of nursing lend themselves to scientific exploration and discovery while others, equally important and likewise deserving expression, reveal themselves only through the artist's vision. So what has been said of poetry, therefore, may hold true in other arts. Each art has its own form of dialogue with reality. The painter, for example, feels with his eyes; he feels lines, points, planes, texture, and color.[5] What could the nurse-painter share? Or as Garner, a nurse-musician, suggests, nursing could be conceptualized along the schema of tones, texture, rhythm, meter, intensity, temperament.[6]

What nursing content would accrue if the various nurse-artists used their forms of knowledge, skill, and vision to explore nursing as the various nurse-scientists do? What can our poets, painters, musicians and dancers see, hear, feel in the nursing dialogue?

Therapeutics

There is a third way in which humanistic nursing and art are related. For many years, the arts have been used in nursing for their therapeutic effects, especially with psychiatric, geriatric, and pediatric patients. The nurse and a patient or a group of patients participate in an artistic experience together. These may be passive activities, such as, attending a concert or play or visiting {89} an art exhibit; or they may be active ones in which nurse and patients are involved in artistic expression or creation.

Music, poetry, painting, drama, and dance have been used effectively in various nursing situations. For instance, Christoffers, a nurse and dancer, emphasizes the importance of body language as communication and supports her view with clinical evidence. She urges nurses to become "physically literate—to develop an understanding and appreciation of the part played by body language in human relationships."[7] Or again, according to Garner, "Music, when carefully planned, can be used as a source of culture, nurturance, communication, socialization, and therapeusis."[8]

A major therapeutic value of art lies in the fact that it confronts one with reality. "Art is a lie which makes us realize the truth."[9] In his novel, The Conspiracy, Hersey has Lucan, a poet, write to Seneca:

"To me the ideal of a work of art is that each man should be able, in contemplating it, to see himself as he really is. Thus art and reality meet. This is the great healing strength of art, this is the power of art, … Art's power which nothing can challenge, is the blinding light of recognition."[10]

By using various art forms the nurse helps the patient experience, become aware of, and express his feelings. When the activity occurs in a group, the members have the additional advantage of sharing in others' expressions and of developing fellow-feeling. Increased socialization is another important therapeutic effect nurse-artists/art appreciators seek in the use of art. A corollary benefit is improved communication between the patient and the nurse or between the patient and others.

Obviously, self-knowledge and fellow-feeling are consistent with the aim of humanistic nursing to nurture well-being and more-being. A person develops his human potential and becomes the unique individual he is through his relationships with other men.

Thus far, this chapter has been concerned with the relatedness of nursing and art. It was seen that nurses may study arts and humanities for a broader understanding of the human situation, may express their nursing worlds through various art forms, and may use the arts therapeutically. Now the question is raised whether nursing is an art, and if so, what kind of art.

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Artful Application

Even the most scientific nurses do not deny that nursing is, in some way, an art. But precisely how the art and science of nursing are interrelated is not clear. For example, Abdellah writes:

"The art of nursing must not be confused with the science of nursing. The former concerns itself with intuitive and technical skills (often ritualistic), and also the more supportive aspects of nursing; the latter concerns itself with scientific truths. Both are important. They are interwoven and complement each other."[11]

However, Abdellah gives no further elaboration of this point. Usually, when nurses are asked about the relatedness of the art and the science of nursing, the view expressed is that science has to do with general principles and laws that govern nursing and art has to do with the particular application of principles in individual cases. Furthermore, when a nurse describes some event as "beautiful nursing" and is pressed to elaborate, she usually describes nursing actions that were performed "artfully," "skillfully," "harmoniously." Thus, in some way, the art of nursing has to do with the nurse's response to human needs through actions that are purposeful and aesthetic.

Useful Art

In current usage, the term "art" is most commonly associated with the beautiful, that is, with aesthetics or the fine arts. Frequently, it is restricted even more to signify one group of the fine arts, namely, painting and sculpture. For instance, one refers simply to an "art exhibit" or an "art" museum but specifies further "a center for the performing arts."

However, historically the word "art" was related to utility and knowledge, and its traditional meanings still exist today. For example, we speak of "industrial arts" and "arts and crafts" through which useful things are produced. On the other hand, "liberal arts" (work befitting a free man) are those related to skills of the mind. We also refer to the art of medicine, of teaching, of nursing, of politics, of navigation, of military strategy, and so forth.

The word "art" can refer to both the effect of human work (works of art) and the cause of things produced by human work (the knowledge and skill of the artist). It is obvious that not only knowledge but also some form of work and skill are involved in all art, useful or fine. "Art" is the root of "artisan" as well as of "artist."[12]

Some arts, such as nursing, medicine, and teaching, may be considered useful, yet they differ from other useful arts, such as industrial arts, for they {91} do not result in tangible products. Nursing for instance, aims purposively for well-being, more-being, health, comfort, growth. These are the results of the art of nursing. As an artist, therefore, the nurse must know how to obtain desired effects and must work skillfully to get them. The nurse cannot make well-being or comfort or health as one can make a shoe or a painting or a speech. The art of nursing involves a skillful doing rather than a making. Furthermore, nursing is concerned with changes in human persons not merely with the transformation of physical objects. It is intersubjective and transactional, so the art of nursing must involve a doing with and a being with.

Performing Art

Along this vein, nursing may be viewed as a kind of performing art. Fahy, nurse-educator-actress, draws an interesting comparison between the process of nursing and acting in a drama.

"In a play the actors know certain things, there are a certain number of given circumstances: plot, events, epoch, time, and plan of action, conditions of life, director's interpretation. The technical things are also there: setting, props, lights, sound effects, and so forth. But it remains at the time of curtain for the actors to go on alone and produce. In the act of nursing there are some known facts that the nursing student or the nurse can pick up: name, age, religion, ethnic background, medical diagnosis, and plan of care (sometimes), her own background knowledge and experience, and her own unique personality. However, when she encounters other patients—watch it! The same thing happens in the teaching-learning process."

"Edward A. Wright in Understanding Today's Theater says about the actor and acting something which I believe about the nurse and nursing.

'… the actor … is his own instrument. His tools are himself, his talent, and his ability. Unlike other creative artists, he must work through and with his own body, voice, emotions, appearance, and his own elusive personal quality…. He uses his intelligence, his memory of emotions, his experiences, and his knowledge of himself and his fellow men—but always he is his own instrument.'"[13]

Here is another example of viewing nursing as a performing art. Once a nurse was trying to describe the nursing care she received from another nurse when she had been ill. She struggled with some details of finer points and then summed it up by saying, "I felt her nursing care was just like a symphony. That's the only way I can describe it."

These comparisons bring many aesthetic qualities to mind, for instance, harmony, rhythm, tone, feeling. Nursing is like music and drama in other ways. The nursing procedure, like a musical score or a play script, allows for individual interpretations, adaptations, and embellishments. Although nurses follow the same general principles, each can develop her own unique style. {92} If nursing really is viewed as a performing art, there are opportunities for creative exploration and development of the art of nursing. And furthermore, these individualized styles of nursing are worthy of description and sharing.

Another similarity is the ephemeral character of nursing, music, and drama. A particular nursing transaction, like a concert or play, is transitory, short-lived. Yet the effects may be long-lasting and remembered. There is this difference in nursing, I believe. Each nursing transaction may flow into a stream of nursing care extending continuously over 24 hours a day for weeks, months, years. And many individual nurses "get into the act." How does this affect the art of nursing? How is nursing like and unlike the other performing arts? The answers to these and similar questions must come from the nurse-artists.

The relatedness of nursing and art, viewed existentially, is more basic, more fundamental than mere similarity of qualities and characteristics as discussed above. Both art and nursing are kinds of lived dialogue. In both, man responds to his world of men and things through distance and relation. They affect him and he affects them with the creative force of his relation.

In fact, one