Hesook Suzie Kim discusses essential qualities of successful nurse

The “Essence of Nursing” can be broken down into a five-level nursing framework that promotes a deep understanding of how nursing should be holistically practiced rather than focusing on particular nursing competencies.

That framework — along with the integral components of nursing practice, including essential tools, collaboration, knowledge application, competence, expertise, and quality of practice — was the subject of the College of Nursing’s annual Fall Distinguished Lecture, delivered by former Dean and Professor Emeritus Hesook Suzie Kim Oct. 16.

“Our aim as nurses is to advance our practice,” Kim told the audience of fellow nurses, as well as nursing students and professors at the Nursing Education Center in Providence. “This model is a guide for developing competence and excellence in nursing.”

The model is the subject of Dr. Kim’s latest book, “The Essence of Nursing Practice: Philosophy and Perspective,” which provides an in-depth analysis of nursing practice as a concept and area of study, rather than as an aggregation of specific techniques and skills. The book discusses and analyzes the five levels of nursing practice — the nursing perspective, nursing knowledge for practice, the philosophy of nursing practice, the dimension of nursing practice, and the process of nursing practice — to provide a model for how nursing should be practiced in order to better serve patients and advance knowledge for practice.

“With its in-depth perspective and unique focus, the book draws from nursing knowledge, but also from the fields of philosophy and the social sciences,” reads an amazon.com description of the book. “As such, it analyzes the essential features and characteristics of nursing practice through a broader lens.”

Kim relayed the key aspects of the book and engaged the audience in a discussion of the essential skills and attributes of a successful nurse. Click here to watch her presentation.

Dr. Kim was a professor in the URI College of Nursing from 1973 until her retirement in 2004. She served as dean of the college from 1983 to 1988, and remains prefessor emeritus. She also was a professor at the Institute of Nursing Science at University of Oslo in Norway from 1992 to 2003. Dr. Kim has published extensively in the area of nursing epistemology, theory development in nursing, the nature of nursing practice, and collaborative decision-making in nursing practice as well as in various areas of clinical nursing research.