‘What do you think therapeutic helping means in a nursing context? What do you think your strengths are as a helper and what do you think you need to develop?’

The therapeutic relationship between nurse and patient can be described as being useful to the patient. In the nursing context helping means that the nurse gets to know their patient in order to provide direct aid and knowledge to them, as well as interpersonal support. Therapeutic can be defined as healing and growth and can be seen as the purpose of nursing. Nursing is understood to mean a therapeutic helping relationship devoted to promoting, restoring, and maintaining the health of individuals, families, groups, and communities. Having an effective relationship and caring for the patient are seen as essential to nursing care. Nurses are expected to be knowledgeable and skillful in helping.

To have a therapeutic helping relationship it is vital that the nurse trusts them self as well as others, as for the relationship to progress the patient and nurse need to place confidence in each other. Caring is an interpersonal process, and having interpersonal trust means that one person in the relationship believes that the other person can be relied and depended on. One of my strengths is that I am able to build a trusting relationship with the patient, through meeting their expectations that will be respected, listened to and treated as an individual. I am good at listening to the patient’s needs which I think is an important quality in nursing.

Therapeutic helping involves the nurse having communication competence. Parbury (2009, p.52) state that ‘nurses must be competent communicators if they are going to develop their own personal sense of agency and use their interactions with patients to be of assistance and to provide help.’ There are two types of skills involved in this, those of being responsive and those of being assertive. Being responsive would perhaps be one of my strengths as a helper, as I feel that I am capable of listening and understanding what others are saying. The other skill is assertiveness, where you are able to state your point of view and express you own ideas, opinions and feelings, this is where I need to develop the skill as I would say that I am more passive and find it harder to be assertive. For me to be able to achieve this I need to improve my confidence as a student nurse and develop my personal style. It is important to have a balance of both of these skills in order for nurses to be competent communicators.

Another aspect of therapeutic helping is having patience, often clients take time to allow us to care for them. Rather than being ‘task orientated’, nurse should be focused on patient centred care. This is one of my qualities as a helper as when a patient is ill or in pain they can be hateful, demanding, and irrational but I am able to understand and help to comfort them to the best of my ability and be kind and helpful know matter what the circumstance is. Another of my strengths would be that along with having patience whilst I am caring for that person I am also aware of time management and try to use my time effectively, without being hurried.

Therapeutic helping also involves the nurse having hope in the respect that in working with people we need to believe in their ability to overcome their problems in their own way. Courage is another part of the helping relationship in order to share ourselves with another person.

In order to care for the patient/client, nurses need to acquire the knowledge about the person. This I will need to develop throughout the course, broadening my knowledge of anatomy and physiology, so that I am able to share my knowledge with others and give patients advice so that they can make informed decisions.

In conclusion therapeutic helping in the nursing context involves a variety of inter-personal skills. Having trust, patience, courage as well as communication competence are amongst the many qualities needed in therapeutic helping. Having the client at the centre of care is essential for effective relationships in healthcare. Requiring the knowledge, nurses are able to give the client/patient as much information as possible. Therapeutic helping is seen as essential to nursing care, having these interpersonal skills helps us to form our relationship with others.