Critical Thinking in Nursing

Introduction

It is common sense that clinical skills are useful to the nursing profession though critical thinking skills are central to anyone who aspires to be the best nurse. The critical thinking skills are of paramount importance in that they are what nurses use to reach sound decisions that can be harnessed to save people’s lives. Therefore, nurses need to embrace situations that nurture this critical thinking process, sharpen the skills and as well participate in the making of decisions, acting and thinking in scenarios with no clear solutions (Papathanasiou, Kleisiaris, Fradelos, Kakou, & Kourkouta, 2014).

Consequently, critical thinking has also been attributed to being purposeful and self- regulating: using cognitive tools to make a judgment (Benner, Hughes, & Sutphen, 2008). Critical thinking is a useful ingredient in the nursing profession, a marker of quality in nursing care and a symbol of accountability.

Moreover, with the ever growing patient complexity, acuity and research needs calls for higher skills are looming. When critical thinking skills are coupled with creativity, nurses are able to get solutions to their problems. Creativity on the other hand has taken the place that was recently occupied by ineffective traditional interventions and thus helped nurses to come up with new ideas, become flexible and more natural (Papathanasiou et al., 2014).

In conclusion, a nurse using critical thinking skills is able to isolate claims that are established on judgment, opinions, conclusion and facts and thus making the nursing profession to be more safe, skillful and efficient (Benner et al., 2008). Nursing education in various levels needs to embrace a perspective conducive to breed critical thinking skills while equally creating room for critical reasoning.