Explain how each goal relates to your professional career development and how you might achieve each

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6565 Week 1 Assignment 1: Professional Goals Becoming a professional nurse requires skills, dedication and competence. These are what I am planning to focus on as I transition from being an RN to NP practice. The nursing career is full of experiences that shape and help to build on our professionalism. However, without goals, one can fail to advance their professionalism and achieve their nursing dreams. In this paper, I am going to share my short-term and long-term professional goals. My goals will enable me to become a better nurse and advance my career and professionalism.

My short-term goals are formulated to help me adapt to being a nurse practitioner. They include adjusting to my new working environment, promoting a safer environment for patients and providing better and quality care. Transitioning to becoming a nurse practitioner comes with a lot of excitement as well as new nursing roles and responsibilities. Therefore, my first shortterm goal is to adapt to the changes of becoming NP. The strategy that I will use to achieve this goal is teamwork (Masters, 2015). I will work in collaboration with other nurses and care providers in the care of patients. I will learn to work competently with my team and inquire about areas that I will require assistance.

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The second goal is to ensure a safer and conducive environment for my patients. As I become an NP, I want to ensure that patients receive enjoy safe environments because most patients, especially inpatients, are prone to secondary communicable and hospital acquired diseases. More so, patients with compromised or weakened immunity. In addition, hospitals are visited with sick people who may transmit their infections to others. My strategy for achieving this goal is by ensuring that the patient environment is as sterile as possible. Also, ensuring that the equipment used in patient assessment and care are sterilized and safe. Furthermore, I will adhere to safety rules and look out for hazards that may put patients at risk (Ammouri et al., 2015).

While practicing my profession, I will ensure that I deliver the best quality care to patients. Providing good quality care is expected of every NP (Sherwood & Barnsteiner, 2017).

To me, this makes me realize my dreams of helping the sick and contributing to making their health better. To achieve this, I will utilize evidence-based practices to provide patient-centred care. This means that I will utilize the best interventions to ensure positive outcomes and involve patients in their care (Potter et al., 2016). More so, I will ensure that patients are more satisfied with care.

My long-term goals will help me better my nursing skills and improve the nursing career.

They include committing to lifelong learning and furthering my education, taking up leadership roles and practicing to the full extent of my education and training. These long-term goals are in line with the Future of Nursing report developed by the Institute of Medicine (Young et al., 2015). They form part of my long-term professional goals, as I desire to see the nursing profession grow and be part of its growth.

To achieve these goals, I will ensure I commit to lifelong learning by attending CME’s, conferences and seminars. I will also further my interests in reading nursing literature.

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Furthermore, I plan to advance my education to obtain a Master’s degree. I also anticipate taking up leadership position that will enable me to lead and mentor other nurses to become better in their professions. Also, to advocate and create policies that will transform the nursing profession and improve healthcare delivery (Young et al., 2015). Lastly, I want to be able to practice to the full extent of my learning. Nurses acquire several competencies in their education but are not in a position to practice them (Young et al., 2015). I look forward to being part of creating change in the profession and enabling myself and other nurses to practice their competencies fully.

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References Ammouri, A. A., Tailakh, A. K., Muliira, J. K., Geethakrishnan, R., & Al Kindi, S. N. (2015).

Patient safety culture among nurses. International Nursing Review, 62(1), 102-110.

Masters, K. (2015). Role development in professional nursing practice. Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.

Potter, P. A., Perry, A. G., Stockert, P., & Hall, A. (2016). Fundamentals of nursing-e-book.

Amsterdam, Netherlands: Elsevier Health Sciences.

Sherwood, G., & Barnsteiner, J. (Eds.). (2017). Quality and safety in nursing: A competency approach to improving outcomes. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

Young, J., Landstrom, G., Rosenberger, S., Guidroz, A. M., & Albu, A. (2015). Leading nursing into the future: Development of a strategic nursing platform on a system level. Nursing Administration Quarterly, 39(3), 239-246.