Watson and Parse's Theory Analysis

During my nursing experiences, I have had a lot of different chances to test a lot of nursing theories. Studying my Masters in Nursing has opened a whole new door for me and taught me how to apply and utilize the theories that have been put into place to help us in caring for and healing our patients. I will focus mainly on Watson's theory and Parse's Theory.

Watson and Parse's Theory Analysis

The viewpoint of the family within Parse's human becoming school of thought is one of synergistic family becoming, concentrating on humanly lived experiences. (Parker, 2006) When referring to this theory it is believed that ones perception of health can be known only through an individual portrayal even though it is produced through interaction with others. When we use this theory, we relate to the families concentration on closeness and lack of involvement, vision and boundaries and its magnitude and morality. Parses' theory defines the family as the other with whom one is strongly attached. (Parker, 2006) Parse does not believe that we should look at the family as a whole. Each individual family member has a different outlook on who is part of the family and who is not part of the family. Nursing uses this theory when encouraging the patients to get in touch with their personal beliefs and explore all of life's alternatives. During this time the patient must decide what type of outcome they will expect. The nurse at the moment will refrain from using judgment or forcing her beliefs on the person during this process. When I am caring for my patients one of the hardest task for me is to not be judgmental and criticizing to certain family members and how they are dealing with certain situations. I have to really stop myself before I speak and make sure I am not going to say anything that could offend a patient and their family. I have strong opinions and values and sometimes it is hard to separate them from my relationship with my patient. When applying this theory we focus on a healthy being, a state of biological, psychological, social and spiritual well-being. The whole process looks more at prevention of disease and maintaining health. (Parker, 2006 p. 188) It is very important that the nurse be knowledgeable about how to interview the patient, keeping her own life expectations and values to herself and only center on the patient's expectations. During this time, I try to imagine that I am clear of all thoughts and that I don't have a lot of strong opinions and I just listen. When they need feedback from me, I try to be very limited if I feel I may be entering my own values into the conversations. My patients always tell me I am a good listener and I always feel like I help them out a lot when I just listen and keep my thoughts to myself. I will offer some advice to them without being too judgmental and without being insulting.

Explicating involves a process of examining the assumptions, values, and meanings embedded in current practices. A person can experience healing through patterns of perception and familiarity and this is most often through a personal process that can only be known by the self. There are three concepts Parse uses to explain the process of illuminating meaning. Imaging, valuing and languaging are all three used to help nurses identify and empathize that individuals shape the significance of experiences. When patients use imaging, they expose the meanings that have impacted them and are important in their experiences, meanings that are created from their individual ways of coping. These coping skills are usually learned behavior from past experiences or knowledge gained from others. Valuing is a progression that will always be varying. Just becoming attentive to our patterns as well as our principles and values, we can recognize our healing path and progress toward what makes our lives gratifying and rewarding. Languaging is the source of the individual's experiences that are expressed by the person. Usually you can identify this through expression of perception, their feelings and reflections on past experiences. Using languaging can really help patients and families put their thoughts together and organize them in a more meaningful way.

I tend to use all three of these when I am caring for my patients. I especially like using languaging for my patients, it helps us understand them more and it helps them open up more and find out some real issues that have been causing problems for a long time. When I use valuing with my patients, I tend to just ask questions about their coping experiences and how family members have helped them. Using this theory, you get a lot of information and knowledge about how well you can expect the families to help or hinder the healing process.

Watson's theory of Human Caring was initially met to bring meaning and focus to nursing as an emerging discipline and distinct health profession that had it own unique values, knowledge, and practices and its won ethic and mission to society. (Parker, 2006 p.296) Watson also offered the clinical caritas and caritas processes. Using this process allows love and caring to come together for a new form of deep transpersonal caring. Watson believed that this promoted healing for the self and others. (Watson, 2003) I believe that this theory of caring is making a considerable impact on the nursing profession and will continue to inspire our nursing practice. Throughout our discussion on Watson, a couple of students really thought that Watson's theory was more related to their work. During week 5 when we compared Watson and Boykin/Schoenhofer, more of the students believed that Watson's theory was more associated to their surroundings and was used more when trying to take a troubled patient and convert them into someone who is seeing things in a new light and having different outlooks. One student spoke about being able to place herself in her patient's life space and connecting on a different level. I believe this to be true, this has happened to me with patients in the past. When you connect and you both feel it, it is amazing how it affects you inside and how awesome you feel that you could accomplish this with practically a total stranger.

These theories are similar in the fact that they both focus on the inner person and past experiences. Both rely on patterns of healing through perceptions and feeling. Both theories reflect on past experiences and the great impact they have on the individual and the family members. These theories have a lot in common when dealing with each family member and how each one copes with different situations. During my research I read a lot of articles that discussed the role the family plays when there is an illness among them. During this reading I realized that Pares and Watson were both a huge part of this process, because they both divide the family and the patient and put them into individual settings to be able to evaluate each members role and caring. In each theory it is looked at and dealt with in very similar ways. They are both dealing with caring on a different level, but using caring in the healing process. The meaning they are both trying to create is multidimensional and we are creating realism through the languaging of valuing and imaging. We want people to co produce what is real for them and use self-expression built from their own values and beliefs. Both theorists believe in the multidimensional being and that when we chose our way, we must rely solely on our values and past experiences. They are very similar in the philosophically likeness related to the process of having one reach deep within themselves and discover strengths they never knew existed.

The theories are different in the aspect that Parse believes in the existential phenomenon and that human becoming is traveling beyond with anticipated hopefulness and belief and in the process they are pushing out or opposing and discovering new ways to view recognizable and unknown territory. Watson's theory is based more on how the patient can remove themselves from the current situation and relate to past experiences to find a way to deal with a current situation. Watson's theory is more of mind-body field and is based on psychology and psychosomatic medicine and intentionality is linked with consciousness. So unlike Watson, Parse does not agree with the concept of consciousness in the theory related to intentionality. For Parse, human existence suggests a more primitive intentionality than required in the relation between identifier and things identified. (Pilkington 2005)
Rogers's theory concentrates on the human beings that living in a three-dimensional world and can actually be aware of other dimensions that affect their lives. (Mitchell,, 2005) Rogers looks more at pan dimensionality but closely relates it to Parses and Watson's theory. Boykin and Schoenhofer are very similar in their thoughts about human caring as well. Their theories reflect Watson and Parses theory about human caring and the way the can take other experiences and relate them to the healing process. The nursing as caring process is used in this theory and relates to some of the ways that Watson would relate to patients in a caring setting. Boykin focuses on listening and refraining from getting to personally involved and keeping your personal feelings out of the conversation. During nursing school and throughout the years of practice in nursing, learning the theories and applying the theories, I believe they all have something in common and that is human caring. Whatever theorist you study, you will find some part of the theory reflecting on human caring of our patients and that is why theory is so important to learn in nursing school and with each new level of education received. You can never completely know all there is to know about theory and how you can apply it to your practice. These classes have taught me that while I was learning these theories before, I was in an overwhelming position and didn't learn as much as I thought and going back and learning the theorist all over again has made a huge impact on my practice and how I influence my nursing students.

References

Mitchell,, Gail J. (October 2005,).Nursing as Caring Theory: Living Caring in Practice. Nursing Science Quarterly,. Vol. 18, 313-319.

WATSON, JEAN (January 2003).The Attending Nurse Caring Model : integrating theory, evidence. Journal of Clinical Nursing. Vol. 12, 360-365.

Brown,Lesley (January 2004).Caring in Action: The Patient Care Facilitator Role. Journal of Clinical Nursing. Vol. 8, 411-413.

Smith,, Marlaine (January 2004).Review of Research. JNursing Science Quarterly. Vol. 17 No. 1, 13-25.

Pilkington,, F. Beryl (April 2005).Caring in Action: The Patient Care Facilitator Role. Nursing Science Quarterly,. Vol. 18 No. 2 , 98-104.

Parker, M. E. (2006). Nursing theories & nursing practice. (2nd ed.) Philadelphia, Pa: F.A Davis Company