CHAPTER 6

Patient Education
and Drug Therapy

Mosby items and derived items © 2011, 2007, 2004 by Mosby, Inc., an affiliate of Elsevier Inc.
The Domains of Learning
 Affective domain
 Psychomotor domain
 Cognitive domain
Patient Education:
Assessment
 Adaptation to any illness
 Cognitive abilities
 Coping mechanisms
 Cultural background
 Developmental status (cognitive and mental
processing abilities)
 Emotional status
 Environment: home and work
Patient Education:
Assessment (cont’d)
 Family relationships
 Financial status
 Psychosocial growth and development
 Health beliefs
 Cultural impact
 Information patient understands about past and
present medical conditions, medical therapy,
medications
Patient Education:
Assessment (cont’d)
 Language(s) spoken
 Level of education/literacy level
 Level of knowledge about current medications
 Misinformation about drug therapy
 Limitations (physical, psychologic, cognitive,
motor)
 Current medications, including over-the-counter
and herbal medications
 Mobility
Patient Education:
Assessment (cont’d)
 Motivation
 Nutritional status
 Past and present health behaviors
 Past and present experience with drug regimens
and other therapies
 Race and/or ethnicity
Patient Education:
Assessment (cont’d)
 Readiness to learn
 Religious beliefs
 Self-care ability
 Sensory status
 Social support
Patient Education:
Nursing Diagnoses
 Deficient knowledge
 Ineffective health maintenance
 Ineffective therapeutic regimen management
 Risk for injury (self)
 Impaired memory
 Noncompliance
Patient Education:
Planning
 Goals and Outcome Criteria
 Measurable
 Realistic
 Based on patient needs
 Stated in patient terms
 Time frame
Patient Education:
Implementation
 Teaching-learning sessions
 Consideration of age-related changes
 Consideration of language barriers
 Safe administration of medications at home
 Return demonstration with equipment
 For adults, it is recommended that materials be
written at an 8th grade level
Patient Education:
Teaching-Learning Sessions

 Individualize the teaching session

 Use positive rewards or reinforcement for accurate
return demonstration of procedures or technique
Patient Education:
Teaching-Learning Sessions
(cont’d)
 Use audiovisual aids
 Involve family members or significant others
 Keep teaching on a level that is meaningful to the
patient
Patient Education:
Teaching-Learning Sessions
(cont’d)
 Consider resources when the patient does not
speak English
 If possible, communicate with the patient in the
patient’s native language
 Use a translator if necessary
 Provide publications in the patient’s native language
Patient Education:
Evaluation
 Validate whether learning has occurred
 Ask questions
 Have the patient provide a return demonstration
 Behavior, such as compliance and adherence to a
schedule
 Occurrence of few or no complications
Patient Education:
Evaluation (cont’d)
 Develop and implement new plan of teaching as
needed for:
 Noncompliance
 Inadequate levels of learning
1. After providing patient education about
medications to a patient who has been newly
diagnosed with type II diabetes mellitus, the nurse
would use which part of the nursing process to
assess whether the patient understands these
new instructions?

1. Assessment
2. Diagnosis
3. Implementation
4. Evaluation
2. A nurse is working in a hospital that serves a
primarily Portuguese population. The nurse
would best serve this patient population by:

1. Learning Portuguese.
2. Always using interpreter services.
3. Using the family member interpreter the
patient provides.
4. Finding a job in a different setting.
3. The nurse is trying to teach an 85-year-old patient
how to use an inhaler. His 84-year-old wife also
comes in for the teaching sessions. Their
daughter comes in to visit in the evenings. The
patient is having trouble remembering the steps.
The nurse should:

1. Provide the package insert that comes with the

medication for the patient to read.
2. Focus the teaching sessions on the patient’s
wife.
3. Provide small amounts of information at a time,
repeating information frequently.
4. Wait until the daughter comes in and teach the
daughter instead.