Mahvash Salsali
University of Medical Sciences, Iran
Title: Standards of practice for holistic nursing and medicine
Biography
Biography: Mahvash Salsali
Abstract
The Standards of Holistic Nursing Practice were developed by the American Holistic Nurses Association (AHNA) as a public statement regarding the practice of holistic nursing as a specialty. The Standards developed from an interest in describing holistic nursing, and in articulating the values, knowledge, and skills required for its practice. Since holistic nursing recognizes the body-mind-spirit connection of persons, holistic nurses often practice complementary/alternative modalities. Holistic nursing embraces all nursing practice that has improvement of healing the whole person from birth to death as its goal. Practicing holistic nursing requires nurses to integrate self-care, self-responsibility, spirituality, and reflection in their lives. The holistic nurse is an instrument of healing and a facilitator in the healing process. Holistic nurses honor the individual's subjective experience about health, health beliefs, and values.
Holistic medicine is a system of health care which fosters a cooperative relationship among all those involved, leading towards optimal attainment of the physical, mental emotional, social and spiritual aspects of health. Holistic medicine means consideration of the complete person, physically, psychologically, socially, and spiritually, in the management and prevention of disease. It is underpinned by the concept that there is a link between our physical health and our more general 'well-being'. In an holistic approach to medicine, there is the belief that our well-being relies not just on what is going on in our body physically in terms of illness or disease, but also on the close inter-relation of this with our psychological, emotional, social, spiritual and environmental state. These different states can be equally important. They should be managed together so that a person is treated as a whole. In fact some feel that the word holistic should really be spelt 'wholistic.
This Paper reviews the development of the practice standards, and provides information on the development and use of the Standards to present insights into the philosophy, values, knowledge, and skills on which holistic care is based, as well as to illustrate the relationship of alternative modalities to these standards.