Cognitive impairment/client teaching fundamentals test 3

Cards (37)

  • Cognition is our ability to think, developing throughout life as we learn how to adapt and use knowledge to solve problems
  • Factors influencing cognition include infection, alcohol/drugs, medications, hypoxia, stress, grief, sensory deficits, and sensory overload
  • Cognitive impairment is an impairment in mental processes affecting how an individual understands and acts in the world, impacting the acquisition of information and knowledge
  • Dementia is a chronic condition of impaired cognition caused by brain disease or injury, affecting 1 in 5 adults older than 70 years, marked by personality changes, memory deficits, and impaired reasoning
  • Dementia assessment cues include forgetfulness, impaired social skills, impaired decision-making, and thinking abilities that interfere with daily living, with gradual, progressive, and irreversible symptoms
  • The stages of dementia include early, moderate, and advanced stages, each with specific symptoms and care needs
  • Delirium is an acute state of cognitive impairment with symptoms like confusion, disorganized thinking, emotional changes, hallucinations, and delusions
  • Delirium interventions involve controlling the environment, ensuring safety, administering prescribed medications, and avoiding sedatives that worsen delirium
  • Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia, a progressive brain disorder slowly destroying memory and thinking skills, with symptoms typically appearing in the mid-60s
  • Nursing interventions for Alzheimer's disease include health promotion, environmental adjustments, medication management, symptom alleviation, safety measures, pain management, and caregiver support
  • Client outcomes in dementia care aim to promote independence, maintain the highest level of functioning, encourage communication, and focus on the client's feelings, avoiding catastrophic reactions
  • Cognitive assessments are used to diagnose dementia or other neurocognitive disorders
  • Factors contributing to the expanding role of teaching in the professional setting include: the importance of client teaching in fulfilling the responsibility of promoting and protecting health, safety, and rights of patients
  • The five rights of teaching are:
    1. Right Time: Is the learner ready?
    2. Right Context: Quiet environment/private/stimulating
    3. Right Goal: Learner actively involved/committed to set goals of learning to achieve desired behavioral change
    4. Right Content: Content appropriate for client’s needs
    5. Right Method: Teaching strategies fit learning style, varied teaching strategies
  • Teaching involves purposeful actions to help individuals acquire knowledge, modify attitudes and behavior, and learn new skills
  • Learning is the intentional gain of new information, attitudes, or skills, promoting behavioral change
  • Motivation influences how much and how quickly a person learns
  • Factors that can affect learning include: client’s age and developmental level, motivation, readiness, physical condition, emotions, timing, active involvement, feedback, repetition, learning environment, scheduling the session, amount and complexity of the content, communication, family support networks, financial resources, cultural factors, and health literacy
  • Types of learning domains:
    • Cognitive: Focuses on thinking, includes knowledge, comprehension, and application
    • Affective: Involves feelings, beliefs, and values
    • Psychomotor: Gaining skills that require mental and physical activity
  • Types of learning methods for cognitive domain:
    • Reports the names and doses of medications
    • Explains the expected effect of prescribed medication
    • Designs a planned schedule for dressing changes for a wound
  • Types of learning methods for affective domain:
    • Asks questions about what to expect during a procedure
    • Chooses to share a story at Alcoholics Anonymous
    • Attends a support group for MS patients
  • Types of learning methods for psychomotor domain:
    • Teaching a client to perform tasks independently increases independence
    • Proper learning of psychomotor skills takes practice
  • Evaluation of learning is essential and can include oral questions, direct observation of client performance, and documenting objective statements about what was taught and what client behaviors and skills demonstrate learning
  • Cognition refers to mental processes that are involved with thinking, reasoning, problem solving, memory, attention, perception, language, and learning.
  • Diagnosis can determine the severity and pattern of cognitive deficits, such as problems with memory, problem solving, attention, or perceptual-motor function.
  • The purpose of the cognitive assessment is to identify strengths, weaknesses, and changes over time
  • Formal diagnosis of cognitive impairment involves neuropsychological testing and medical evaluation.
  • Dementia is an acquired global deterioration from normal functioning characterized by multiple deficits in cognition, behavior, or mood.
  • A comprehensive evaluation includes an interview with the patient and caregiver, observation of behavior, review of medical records, and standardized tests
  • Early diagnosis allows for early intervention and management.
  • The Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) is commonly used as an assessment tool for cognitive function.
  • There are several types of dementias including Alzheimer's type, vascular dementia, Lewy body dementia, frontotemporal lobar degeneration, Parkinson's disease dementia, Huntington's disease, normal pressure hydrocephalus, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, HIV/AIDS associated dementia complex, substance-induced persisting dementia, traumatic brain injury related dementia, and mixed dementia.
  • Dementia is characterized by significant decline from previous levels of performance in at least two areas such as memory, language, judgment, problem solving, attention, reasoning, visual perception, motor skills, personality changes, mood swings, agitation, apathy, depression, anxiety, irritability, sleep disturbances, wandering, aggression, hallucinations, paranoia, and delusions.
  • The purpose of the cognitive assessment is to identify strengths, weaknesses, and changes over time
  • The brain has two hemispheres (left and right) connected by the corpus callosum, which allows communication between them.
  • The assessment process involves identifying strengths and weaknesses through standardized tests, interviews, observations, and informant reports.
  • Cognitive decline may be due to various factors including age, education level, genetics, lifestyle choices, and environmental exposures.