Multi-professional Support of Learning and Assessment in Practice Essay

Multi-professional Support of Learning and Assessment in Practice - Essay Example Urine dipstick as an innovation and its usefulness in practice Urinalysis is a preferred method of testing because of its ease of administration, relevance to many diseases, and its relative inexpensiveness (Hedin et. al., 2002). Nursing students who intend on becoming serious professionals cannot brush through the study of this test. It is done by immersing a test strip into urine, where a reaction will occur and the results will be interpreted on the basis of that reaction. Nurses use the test to detect diabetes, urinary infections, renal failure, pregnancy, and several other ailments (Juthani-Mehta et. al., 2007). The following diseases are evident in the test strip. Once a practitioner finds glucose, then this could be a sign of diabetes mellitus. However, confirmatory tests need to be done in order to make conclusive diagnoses. Renal malfunctions may also be found when proteins are in the test strip. However, this should apply to hypertensive patients. Urinary infections can be diagnosed if the strip contains blood. The latter may also be indicative of urological cancer. Other diseases that could be diagnosed include obstructive jaundice, and diabetes mellitus if leucocytes, and billirubin are found, respectively. When conducting the test, nurses must perform go through a series of precautions prior to actual administration of the tests. They must confirm that the sample was collected no less than four hours after storage in the bladder (Deville et. al., 2004). It is always preferable to use fresh samples for the tests. Professionals must exercise caution when storing and timing the tests. A nurse must then immerse the reagent strip into the urine and remove it immediately. Thereafter, the dipstick should be placed horizontally and the subsequent colour should be compared with a colour chart in the lab. Abnormalities should be noted and recorded. Source: http://learn.parallax.com/reference/urinalysis-test-strip-color-chart Nurses need to take into account a number of things that might interfere with the accuracy of results. First, they must consider the possibility of false positives and negatives caused by smoking, taking vitamin C and other drugs or conditions. This implies that they ought to consider the background of the patient’s illness. Sometimes the possibility of wrong test diagnosis may be true if the patient continues to report similar complaints. The practitioner may need to repeat the test for confirmation. Result interpretation ought not to be taken at face value. For instance, the presence of bacteria may not always be indicative of an infection. This is only confirmed once the nurse determines the quantity of the pathogens. Once the threshold has been reached, then conclusive assertions can be made. White blood cells may seem abnormal but such a condition may not immediately mean that the patient has a disease related to their immunity. Sometimes cervical and vaginal white cells may contaminate samples. Additio nally, the presence of epithelial cells should immediately be assumed to indicate the presence of a malignancy.