learning theories

Select a learning theories (power point attached) and the principles you think are most useful to Advanced Practice Nurses and why you think these theories are most effective. Describe how you would apply these theories in educating patients on how to manage a chronic disease in order to improve their quality of life and reduce hospital readmissions. (Examples of chronic diseases are Congestive Heart Failure or Kidney Disease).

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solution

Understanding Learning theories form the basic foundation of education psychology. Trainers are guided by the general principles of these theories in delivering the best of their knowledge in accordance with the learning situation.  Of the four learning theories; Behaviorist, cognitive, psychodynamic and humanistic theories, cognitive theory appears to be the most effective if applied in patient education as a professional aspect of nursing practice.

Learning is a permanent change in a person’s thinking, emotions, skills and behaviors as a result of experience (Bastable, 2003). Unlike other theories, cognitive theories depict learning as a process that occurs internally making the change permanent. Moreover, it focuses on improving an individual’s consciousness, thinking capabilities, understanding and organization. This is linked with permanent change in a person’s capacity and capability to respond. It equips learners with questioning and problem solving skills which enables them to explore and process information. As a result, there is active learning, problem solving and search for new information in relation to previous experience for better understanding.

For effective chronic disease management, two principles can be applied to ensure proper understanding and learning. By application of the Pragnanz principle, an individual’s perception of a disease can be broken into its simplest form which helps understand its meaning.  Learning principle illustrates that real life learning is only possible through understanding and discovering underlying issues. Hence, patients should be taught on the underlying and root causes of chronic diseases.  Nurse Practioners should apply these principles in patient education sessions to appear as one and not as a collection of distinct facts. For instance, in blood pressure lessons, the patient should be taught on blood pressure causes, understand the measurement of blood pressure and their importance, the concept of blood pressure and blood flow in relation to the heart beat rather than the general nutritional care (Daskalopoulou 2015). This can help identify the appropriate nursing care practice and help improve the quality of life and reduce hospital readmissions (Aliakbari, 2015).

References

Aliakbari, F. Parvin, N., Heidari, M., & Haghani, F. (2015). Learning theories application in nursing education. Journal of education and health promotion, 4.

Bastable, S. B. (2003). Nurse as educator: Principles of teaching and learning for nursing practice. Jones & Bartlett Learning

Daskalopoulou, S. S., Rabi, D. M., Zarnke, K. B., Dasgupta, K., Nerenberg, K., Cloutier, L., & McKay, D. W. (2015). The 2015 Canadian Hypertension Education Program recommendations for blood pressure measurement, diagnosis, and assessment of risk, prevention, and treatment of hypertension. Canadian Journal of Cardiology, 31(5), 549-568.