Subject Code & Title :- PHE1IDH E3 The Enquiry 3 Reflective Piece
Assessment Type :- Assignment
Reflective Practice In Health: What is it and why do we use it?
Reflective practice is seen as a means of improving clinical practice and consequently quality of care through exploring and evaluating one’s under standing of a problem rather than simply trying to solve it.
PHE1IDH E3 The Enquiry 3 Reflective Piece Assignment – Australia

Reflective practice is crucial in continuous development and reassessment of skills when working in health care or with people more generally A reflective practitioner:
1. Reflects on feedback and integrates changes into practice;
2. Reflects on how own perceptions, attitudes and beliefs impact on practice;
3. Identifies knowledge deficits and seeks clarification; and
4. Ensures procedures for safety and quality assurance are implemented.

Learning to be a reflective practitioner includes not only acquiring technical expertise but also the ability to establish meaningful connections between theory and practice, providing a rationale for action. In this sense reflective practice can be likened to a bridge between theory and practice and a power ful means of using theory to inform practice.

With a bit of thought reflections can be a very useful tool in learning. It allows you to recognise your own strengths and weakness and use this to guide on going learning. Through reflection you will develop your skills in self-directed learning advance your self-and social awareness and sub sequently improve the quality of care you are able to provide. Reflective practice occurs when you explore an experience you have had to identify what happened and what your role in this experience was including your behaviour and thinking related emotions perceptions and attitudes. This allows you to identify changes to your approach for similar future events. If reflective practice is performed comprehensively regularly and honestly it will lead to improved performance.

The purpose of this assessment task:
Reflective practice is often first introduced to students in university.This may be via the means of reflecting on a patient case. In this assessment task we are able to use a fictious patient Rosa to ask students to consider what thoughts feelings perceptions attitudes and behaviours are evoked by the case study. This in turn will allow you to link theory to practice. Engaging in this process will help you develop skills as a reflective practitioner. It also has the potential to build confidence to enter future placements and ultimately the work force as you will have already considered and reflected upon some of the examples and situations that you may encounter.

Please note:
It is essential when writing a reflective piece that you refer to the experience in the first person therefore the use of ‘I’ is appropriate for this style of writing. This 600-word task only involves reflecting upon your own thoughts feelings perceptions attitudes and behaviours as well as consideration of how you might modify your own thoughts feelings perceptions attitudes and behaviours. No external research needs to be completed for this task and thus references are not required.This will significantly reduce the preparation and time required to complete this task.

We know that historically this task has taken some students less than a day to complete how ever in order to pace your learning and taking into consideration your other subjects and personal commitments please see below a planner that covers the completion of your assessment over three weeks.

WEEK 9:
If you have not already done so, it is now time to familiarise your self with the requirements of the Enquiry 3 Reflective Piece. Please follow the steps below:

1.Examine the Enquiry 3 Assessment Guide located in the Assessment folder You should carefully read the requirements for the reflective piece

2.Review the Enquiry 3 FAQ’s (found in on pages 7-11 of the Enquiry 3 Assessment Guide).
a.The Assessment Guide contains frequently asked questions pertaining to the requirements of the reflection expression and formatting.
b. Please take the time to carefully read each FAQ, as these questions provide clear and help ful information regarding how best to produce your reflective piece.

3.Review the Enquiry 3 Marking Rubric (found on pages 12-13 of the Enquiry 3 Assessment Guide).

i. Please use the rubric to under stand the breakdown of marks for this assessment task. The amount of detail that you should include for each section should be guided by the weighting of marks allocated to each section on the marking rubric.

4.Review the Enquiry 3 Case Specific Resources. In particular you should review the contextual information case narrative clinical notes and Rosa’s current clinical status.

We encourage you to read the case specific resources and as you do reflect that is think deeply and personally about what you are reading. What exactly would you find challenging about Rosa’s behaviour and presentation? Personality emotions memory difficulties communication? For example when you read that Rosa is experiencing memory issues how did you feel? If you felt sad why did you react this way? Perhaps you are a highly empathic person that might find it challenging to work with older adults like Rosa who are experiencing complex health issues? Or maybe you can relate to Rosa’s difficulties as you had a grandparent with Dementia. What ever the reason/s consider how these health-related topics might impact your interactions and/or behaviour when working with Rosa.

WEEK 10:
It is now time to begin writing your reflective piece. The first requirement of the task asks you to:

1. Identify one health-related topic choose from any of the PHE1IDH weekly topics e.g.,memory pain psychological disorders health-risk behaviours that you might be challenged by when working with Rosa.
2. The health related topic refers to one the topics covered in Enquiries 1-3 i.e. learning human development memory intelligence psychological disorders health risk behaviours motivation behaviour change social psychology communication personality pain emotions stress.You are able to choose one of these topics across any of the Enquiries 1, 2, or 3 to discuss in your reflective piece. Therefore you can choose one of the 14 topics in the subject including those that we are yet to cover.
3. It is suggested that you clearly identify the one chosen health related topic that will be discussed at the beginning of your reflective piece this may be done in a short introduction. You want the topic to be clear to the marker so they are able to award you with the associated marks (5 marks) for identifying the one topic on the marking rubric.

2a. Discuss your thoughts feelings perceptions attitudes and behaviours (i.e., reflect upon why you have identified the health-related topic as most challenging to you).

PHE1IDH E3 The Enquiry 3 Reflective Piece Assignment – Australia

For example: I have identified memory as potentially impacting my future interactions with Rosa because I am a rather close-minded individual and can become easily frustrated when things don’t go the way I envisage. In the past this has led me to lack the ability to get to know an individual’s perspective and under stand what they are dealing with.

2b. Reflect upon your past experiences and consider how these may be impacting your thoughts feelings perceptions attitudes and behaviours with regard to your chosen health-related topic.

For example: I anticipate that Rosa’s memory issues be extremely challenging for me because my grand father passed away after a progressive decline due to Dementia. This experience may trigger an emotional response in me which may impact my future practice.

I. In order to incorporate your previous experiences into your reflection you may like to consider how you felt after reading Rosa’s hospital records. Was there some thing that really resonated with you based on your own past experiences? For example Rosa’s issues with memory may remind you of an older adult in your family. They may have experienced a similar decline in memory and thus if you were met with a similar experience in your future practice this may bring up unresolved emotions and thus be challenging.

WEEK 11:
It is now time to respond to Question 3(a) and 3(b):
3(a). In the context of your chosen health related topic reflect upon how you might modify your thoughts feelings perceptions attitudes and behaviours to work effectively with Rosa in the future.

For example:
Based on the challenges I have identified in relation to memory, in order to work effectively with Rosa I believe I would benefit from engaging in professional development on Dementia and how to effectively communicate with older adults with memory issues.

PHE1IDH E3 The Enquiry 3 Reflective Piece Assignment – Australia

I. When discussing the modification/s please note this is about modifying your own perceptions and/or behaviours not that of Rosa. For example if you identified emotions as a health-related topic it would not be appropriate here to explore how you would modify Rosa’s emotions this reflective piece is about you!

3(b). Reflect upon the self-care practices that you could put in place to maintain your well being when working with clients such as Rosa.

For example:
If I find myself getting frustrated with Rosa, I could subtly engage in some mindful breathing and following the consultation debrief with a senior member of staff. Now that you have answered all of the assessment questions it is time to focus on the structure and formatting of your reflective piece.

STRUCTURE:
In terms of structuring your reflection, you may wish to follow the below example:
The health-related topic I feel may potentially impact my interactions with Rosa is pain.
The hospital records indicate that Rosa is a highly neurotic individual who behaves aggressively when she is scared or in pain. I believe I will become frustrated with Rosa if she exhibits this type of behaviour because my personality is rather close-minded, and I find it difficult to see another person’s perspective or easily understand how they are feeling. I feel as though my frustration might turn into anger toward Rosa if she is not compliant to my advice. More over my relationship with my mother who is also highly neurotic makes me realise that I don’t react well to someone who can’t be reasoned with.

In order to manage my potential frustration and anger when working with Rosa I could subtly engage in some mindful breathing and following the consultation debrief with a senior member of staff.