Essay Example on Parents' Uphill Task: Ensuring Smooth Home Care for Kids with Tracheotomies

Introduction

Kids with tracheotomies are increasingly discharged home for progressive care by their parents. Nurses have an uphill task for providing these parents with a broad education need for a smooth and successful transition to home care. Tracheostomy has significantly been viewed as a non-compulsory procedure done in children who cannot survive without an artificial ventilator support machine. Joseph (2011) indicated that approximately 70 percent of all infants who need a tracheostomy procedure are younger than one year of age. As opposed to lengthy mechanical ventilation with an endotracheal tube, tracheostomy procedure helps these children to nurture and develop better (Joseph, 2011). Further, establish facial expression, and phonation, on top of learning how to suck. The paper seeks to analyze neonatal and pediatric nurses' ways of effectively educating parents of children with a tracheostomy to prove secure, quality care to their child after they get discharged.

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Many parents, particularly from the minority communities, are finding it a challenge to access health insurance from Medicare or Medicaid. Further, increased hospital expenses are forcing parents of infants with a tracheostomy to feel the burden. In response to this situation, many infants with tracheostomy are increasingly being discharged to continue with care in home settings (Joseph, 2011). Nonetheless, it is not an easy task as parents need to do thorough training on all elements of tracheostomy and the technology improvised for infant care. Nevertheless, the main challenge is that the requisite professional education is available in urban environments, limited personnel, and insurance restrictions may compel parents to assume the whole responsibility to care for their kids with a tracheostomy.

Teaching and Learning Aspects

A nurse must develop an all-encompassing education ad discharge plan, once the decision to conduct a tracheostomy is decided. The child may need several technologies to support the care due to underlying conditions that are usually present. Therefore, while initiating a teaching curricular for families of infants with a tracheostomy, adult learning scopes should be utilized. Knowles reckons that adults are required to be involved in the formulation and assessment of their instruction and require practical experience to provide the foundation for learning elements (Chinnasamy, 2013).

Adult learning is a problem-oriented teaching strategy rather than content centered. The entire process involved in teaching the parents mimics a nursing process (Chinnasamy, 2013). Hence, nurses and parents must have access to all learning needs and a proper plan in which the learning will effectively be grounded (Joseph, 2011). Nurses need to use several visual components like diagrams, pictures, video instruction, and interactive computer programs to disseminate knowledge while teaching families of infants with a tracheostomy. For example, "Emmi Solutions" is dedicated to patient education using interactive innovation to deliver complex data in simple, construable, and visual format (Emmi Solutions, 2010).

Active participation technique in the care of a child with tracheostomy permits families to develop an augmented sensitivity to their infant needs, increase confidence in learning caregiving (Joseph, 2011). Further, it equips them with emergency administration competencies, and an avenue to participate in formal and informal deliberations on care topics (Joseph, 2011). While delivering this form of parental education, a multidisciplinary panel entailing respiratory therapists, doctors, and nurses should be hired to plan family meetings and organize regular training, starting from simple metrics to intricate details. For instance, a respiratory expert may teach the function of a ventilator and necessary life support for a child (Joseph, 2011). A nurse may educate on possible tracheostomy site care, changing the tracheostomy tube, and suctioning.

Conclusion

The essay has successfully developed a parent's teaching guideline on how to care for their children with a tracheostomy. It is a complex process that is only situated in urban settings, hence proving a costly process for rural parents with children requiring this procedure. The procedure developed above follows two key teaching strategies; adult learning approach and active participation technique.

References

Chinnasamy, J. (2013). Mentoring and adult learning: Andragogy in action. International Journal of Management Research and Reviews, 3(5), 2835. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jayakumar_Chinnasamy/publication/262764508_MENTORING_AND_ADULT_LEARNING_ANDRAGOGY_IN_ACTION/links/02e7e538c98f153cdb000000/MENTORING-AND-ADULT-LEARNING-ANDRAGOGY-IN-ACTION.pdf

Emmi Solutions. (2010, April 22). https://www.wolterskluwer.com/en/solutions/emmi

Joseph, R. A. (2011). Tracheostomy in infants: parent education for home care. Neonatal Network, 30(4), 231-242. http://www.academyofneonatalnursing.org/WritingCenter/TracheostomyinInfants.pdf