Directed Care: Showcasing the Expertise of Professional Nurses in Ambulatory Primary Care

Proposing a modified concept of care management, DIRECTED CARE captures the leadership and management expertise of professional nurses to guide individuals to more effective and efficient utilization of health care resources and to influence their personal health behaviors toward optimal wellness. The discussion sheds the passive patient image as merely a recipient of services. It is replaced with active participation of a health care consumer in collaboration with the health care providers where for and to become with. An upstream, preventive care approach is promoted throughout the book. Registered nurses are presented working in tandem with their nurse practitioner colleagues as clinical team-based members in an ambulatory primary care setting and in a proposed Patient-Centered Medical Home model. -Professional nurses are described as independent providers of DIRECTED CARE activities. -Wellness care is segmented from illness care within the discussion of the DIRECTED CARE concept. -Tailored communication is emphasized as an important part of interactions with health care consumers. -A Summary Health Care Record and Health Monitoring Plan are presented to illustrate the manner in which health data can be organized for individual health care consumers that result in data consolidation and review simplification.