Clinical supervision: A mechanism to support person‐centred practice? An integrative review of the literature

Abstract

Aims To explore whether clinical supervision has an influence on person‐centred practice. Background The ability to deliver person‐centred care and the ability to engage in reflective practice are two key skills expected of nurses. Person‐centred care shifts nurses thinking from the patient's disease state to their personhood. Clinical supervision has been proposed as a place to explore person‐centred care. Person‐centred practice extends person‐centredness to enhance healthful relationships between care providers, services users and their significant others. Methods An integrative literature was conducted with the key words ‘clinical supervision’ and ‘person‐centredness’ within CINAHL, Medline, PsychInfo and Google Scholar. The PRISMA statement was used to report the identification, selection, appraisal and synthesis of articles and PRISMA diagram reports the selection process. The Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool was used to appraise the articles, followed by a thematic analysis. The Template for Intervention Description and Replication was used to explore the concept of clinical supervision. Results Twelve articles met the inclusion criteria. Person‐centredness and clinical supervision are not universally defined concepts. Clinical supervision in this context was mainly an adjunct to educative programmes. Clinical supervision has a positive influence on participants’ person‐centred attributes, but the influence on others is less clear. The clinical supervisor's qualities are pivotal to supervisions’ success. Conclusions Clinical supervision is a common reflective strategy used to explore nursing practice, yet as a strategy to enhance person‐centred practices, is under‐researched. Participants can experience person‐centredness when their supervisor has person‐centred attributes, an important aspect in delivering person‐centred care. Relevance to clinical practice This review identified a gap in the literature between two common nursing concepts ‘clinical supervision’ and ‘person‐centred care/practices’. There is a need to conduct further research into the combination of these concepts to seek ways to embed person‐centredness into health care and everyday nursing practice.

Development and acceptability of the person‐centred observation and reflection tool for supporting staff and practice development in dementia care services

“…Reflection is an established approach to learning (Campbell & Rogers, 2022; Moon, 2004; Schon, 1991) and the development of individual practice across a range of sectors (Kraft et al, 2021). Reflection with a mentor or supervisor is a well‐established mechanism for personal development and support within health and care services but is relatively unexplored in the context of delivery and embedding of person‐centred dementia care (Edgar et al2023). This study adds to this body of knowledge by demonstrating observation and reflection are seen as feasible mechanisms to facilitate the delivery of PCC.…”

Nursing home managers' descriptions of multi‐level barriers to leading person‐centred care: A content analysis

“…Chenoweth et al (2015) also reported that staff understanding, knowledge, acceptance and perseverance in applying person-centred principles were crucial factors for improving PCC, which resonates with the findings in the current study. However, a recent review reported that clinical supervision has the potential to increase self-awareness and enable staff to reflect upon themselves and become aware of the choices they make in practice, which in turn has the potential to make staff choose future behaviours consistent with their new insights (Denise et al, 2022). Seen in relation to the current study, an important implication for management and stakeholders that strive to promote person-centred practices may be that offering clinical supervision to address negative mindsets and low motivation will allow staff to reflect on their choices and behaviours and the subsequent risk of lower quality care.…”

Enhancing new graduate nurses and midwives person‐centredness through clinical supervision during COVID‐19; evaluation of a non‐randomized intervention study

“…leadership, new graduates, nurse-patient relationships, organisational behaviour, personcentred, practice development, practice-based learning, professional development, quantitative approaches, reflective practice A number of recent position papers advocate that all nurses and midwives entering a workforce should have access to clinical supervision that meets individual needs (Australian College of Midwives et al, 2019;Key et al, 2019). Clinical supervision is a broad term, not universally defined or applied (Edgar et al, 2022). Bond and Holland (2010) define it as 'the regular protected time for facilitated in-depth reflection, on complex issues influencing clinical practice' (Bond & Holland, 2010, p. 10).…”

“…There is support that clinical supervision could enhance person‐centred care (Bond & Holland, 2010). A recent literature review combining the two concepts of person‐centred practice and clinical supervision found clinical supervision could provide a space to discuss the meaning of person‐centred care and consider the barriers to its practice however there is lack of evidence that it enhances person‐centredness as a stand‐alone strategy in nursing (Edgar et al., 2022). The review also highlighted the importance of a supportive supervisor and their person‐centred attributes.…”