Primary and Team Nursing Care
Cody Crohurst
PMI Nursing Program
Nur 232
Instructor: Lin Nosek
September 11, 2013

Patient Care Delivery Methods Within today’s health care systems there are a variety of different methods that are used to provide adequate care for people seeking health care. Some of these methods are managed care, functional nursing, team nursing, primary nursing, and patient-focused care. Managed care will be seen in a variety of settings such as Health Maintenance Organizations (HMO) of Preferred Provider Organizations (PPO). Functional nursing is a task oriented environment, which each health care provider is assigned a task and reports to a head nurse. In team nursing, which will be discussed more in depth later, involves a nurse that is in charge of group of different members that takes care of a group of patients. Primary nursing, also discussed more in depth in this paper, involves a primary nurse that cares for all needs of a patient within a 24 hour time frame. Lastly, there is patient-focused care and this method involves the patient, the patient’s family, and the health care team to collectively make decisions about the health care for that individual. Primary and team nursing will be explained further in detail throughout this paper as well as being compared to one another as well as the difference between them explained. Furthermore how these methods are appropriate in today’s health care facilities will also be investigated.
Primary Nursing Care Primary care nursing is a system in which one nurse is caring for all the needs of a patient or more within a 24 hour period from admission to discharge (CITE). This nurse is responsible for all necessary nursing care that the patient required during the shift. When the primary nurse is off of shift an associate nurse, a nurse that takes that patient over, fills in for the