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Summary
This article describes the author's first experience of learning from reflection on the practice of administering intramuscular injections, using critical incident analysis. The value of effective mentoring on the learning experience is also explored.
Keywords
Intramuscular injections; Practice anxiety; Reflection
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REFLECTION IS A PROCESS through which healthcare practitioners and students can learn from experiences and use the knowledge to inform and improve practice. The ability to reflect on one's actions is particularly pertinent in clinical practice. There is no consensus on the definition of reflection (Jarvis 1992, Atkins and Murphy 1993). Reid (1993) defined reflection as: 'a process of reviewing an experience of practice to describe, analyse, evaluate and so inform learning about practice'. Schon (1983) identified two types of reflection:
* Reflection in action, which takes place during the event - the practitioner may not be aware that it is happening.
* Reflection on action, which takes place after the event.
Jasper (2003) concluded that reflecting on action transformed experience into knowledge.
This article focuses on the first author's experience of learning from reflection on intramuscular (IM) injections, using Gibbs's (1988) reflective model (Figure 1) and demonstrates how practice anxiety can be dealt with through effective mentoring. Gibbs's framework for reflection is a seminal theory on reflective practice (Jasper 2003). The reflective cycle contains six stages: description, feelings, evaluation, analysis of the incident, conclusion and an action plan. These stages were used to guide the first author through the process of reflecting on the critical incident.
The reflective cycle
Description Before I began my nurse training I had fears about administering IM injections and I arrived on my third placement, with a community mental health team, lacking experience in this area. Within the first week of my third placement I was offered the opportunity to administer a depot injection, however, I declined, feeling that I was not competent to do so. During a private discussion with an allocated mentor my feelings relating to administering depot...