Professional Growth Flashcards
Participation and active involvement in the public policy arena is mandated by which component of professional social work practice?
a. Advocacy
b. Ethics
c. Continuing education
d. Integrity
A
Which of the following is not an example of an effective plan for continuing education in hospice/palliative care?
a. Completing educational programs specific to hospice/palliative care related issues.
b. Participating in study sessions/groups for CHPN exam review/certification.
c. Completing only the required number of CE’s for licensure within your state.
d. Participating in state or national committee’s involved with hospice/palliative care.
c -
c - Completing only the required number of CE’s for continued licensure within your state is not an effective plan for continuing education in hospice/palliative care. An effective plan would include continuing education specific to hospice and palliative care, pain and symptom management, end-of-life issues, advocacy, etc.
x
x
Of the stages of adaptation to hospice/palliative care social work , in which state are MSWs most at risk for professional boundary violations?
a. Emotional arrival
b. Deep compassion
c. Depression.
d. Emotional survival
d - Within in the emotional survival stage of adaptation, MSW have increasing levels of emotional involvement and over-identification with the patient’s situation without the full knowledge and understanding of the magnitude of practice that can put them at risk for crossing those professional boundaries.
Research has shown there to be five stages of adaptation to hospice/palliative care staff. All of the following are recognized as part of those stages except:
a. Emotional survival
b. Emotional arrival
c. Emotional intelligence
d. Deep compassion
c - Emotional intelligence is not one of the stages of adaptation. The stages are as follows: Intellectualization, Emotional survival, Depression, Emotional arrival, and Deep compassion.
Which of the following are important factors for hospice and palliative care staff to recognize as important to preventing burnout and the management of self-care?
a. Role strain
b. Role conflict
c. Role overload
d. All of the above
d - All of the above are important factors for staff to recognize as potentially impacting their self-care and burnout. Role strain reflects the difficulty performing various aspects of one’s professional role, difficulty with constant exposure to the needs of dying persons and their families. Role conflict reflects the challenge faced when a person holds two or more roles and the demands of one role conflict with the demands of the other. Role overload reflects the pressures of practice and work overload leading to increased level of stress and feelings of burnout.
Role redefinition is outlined as which of the following?
a. A personal stress management method to lessen overload and clarify roles.
b. An organizational method to ensure there is effective employee/role matching.
c. A personal stress management method to ensure proper compensation.
d. An organizational method to ensure proper title and compensation for specific roles.
a - Role redefinition is a personal stress management method utilized to lessen overload and clarify roles in addition to integrating the various roles that individuals hold.
Burnout and compassion fatigue/occupational stress has been shown to be related to the mismatch of six domains within the work environment. Which of the following is not one of the six domains?
a. Control
b. Schedule
c. Workload
d. Values
b -Schedule is not one of the six domains identified. They are workload, control, rewards, community, fairness and values.
Compassion fatigue is most accurately reflected by which of the following statements?
a. The perception that an individual has used up all of his/her available energy and is unable to continue to perform.
b. When the degree of stress is greater than the available coping mechanism.
c. When the degree of stress is not stimulating enough.
d. Secondary traumatic stress experienced by caregivers of those suffering from physical or emotional pain.
d - Compassion fatigue is defined as secondary traumatic stress experienced by caregivers of those suffering from physical or emotional pain. Burnout is the perception that an individual has used up all their available energy and is unable to continue to perform. Negative stress symptoms occur when the degree of stress is greater than the available coping mechanism and apathy, boredom, lack of interest and low motivation occur when the degree of stress is not stimulating enough
In order for hospice/ palliative care staff to effectively care for their patients they must also focus on which of the following personal needs?
a. Physical, social, and spiritual.
b. Emotional, psychological and spiritual.
c. Psychological, social and spiritual.
d. Emotional, physical, and spiritual.
d - In order to effectively care for hospice patients and their families, staff must recognize and attend to their own personal emotional, physical and spiritual needs.
Hospice and palliative staff need to routinely practice self-care in order to be able to maintain the pressures and stress of this work. Which of the following would not be considered effective methods of self-care?
a. Getting regular exercise at least 3 times a week.
b. Scheduling frequent social outings involving alcohol.
c. Ensuring diet is of high nutritional value.
d. Obtaining 7-8 hours of sleep per night.
b - Scheduling social outings is important to spend time with friends and family, but including alcohol is not an effective means of self-care. Regular exercise, proper diet and adequate sleep are all very important methods along with reading, music, developing hobbies and taking regular vacations.
Your hospice team has been extremely short-staffed and you have been working 8 days in a row to meet patient/family needs. Your supervisor asks you to pick up an on-call shift on your only day off stating there is no one else available. Your best response to this is which of the following?
a. Break down in tears and state that you need a break and cannot do it.
b. Agree to take this shift but clearly state that it is the last one you can do.
c. State there is no way you can do another shift and storm out of the office.
d. Discuss your recent contributions with the supervisor, and politely decline the shift.
d -
d - The best response here is to discuss your recent contributions to the team over the past 8 days and then politely decline the shift. Becoming emotional, or agreeing to take yet another shift are not examples of maintaining professional behavior or boundaries. In order for hospice/palliative nurses to be effective, they must recognize the need for and actively engage in self-care and maintain professional/personal boundaries.
You have been designated to develop a process improvement team to address specific patient care issues within your hospice organization. What should be your first step in identifying what your objective/goal is for each issue?
a. Identify what is most important to the organizational bottom-line.
b. Locate resources and team members outside of your agency and gather input.
c. Identify benchmarks within other hospice organizations.
d. Consult with the Medical Director to gather input.
c - The first step in identifying what the objective/goals should be for the process improvement efforts would be to identify benchmarks within other hospice organizations. Benchmarks reflect the search for best practices that consistently produce best in world results and outline the gold standard of care. As noted above, process improvements should be customer focused, and while gathering input from within and outside of the organization may be helpful, it would not necessarily be best practice
Which of the following is identified by JCAHCO as the most frequent root cause of adverse sentinel events?
a. Patient falls
b. Medication errors
c. Communication failures
d. Staffing issues
c - The most frequent root cause of adverse sentinel events is communication failures. This is why patient-centered care focuses on human interactions and communication as one of its strategies.
Deming identified six key principles of Quality Improvement (QI) which are applicable to all of healthcare including hospice and palliative care. Which of the following was NOT identified by Deming as being a key QI principle?
a. Continual learning
b. Organizationally-driven/focused
c. System organization and alignment
d. Continual improvement and innovation
b - The six key principles as identified by Deming are Customer-driven, System optimization and alignment, Continual improvement and innovation, Continual learning, Management through knowledge, and Collaboration and mutual respect.
