Teaches temperature, pulse, respirations, blood pressure, oxygen saturation, pain scores, and when a number needs action. You will practice turning simple measurements into useful patient information.

Builds therapeutic communication, active listening, plain-language teaching, family conversations, and de-escalation. You will practice speaking clearly when people are scared, tired, angry, or in pain.

Shows how nursing grew from informal care into a licensed, evidence-based profession shaped by wars, public health, hospitals, education, unions, civil rights, and technology. The chapter connects today’s roles and rules to the field’s evolution.

Teaches the nursing process, clinical judgment, prioritization, and noticing when a patient’s story does not match the numbers. You will practice moving from cues to decisions instead of memorizing isolated facts.

Covers germs, chains of infection, hand hygiene, PPE, isolation precautions, sterile technique, and healthcare-associated infections. You will practice the routines that protect patients, coworkers, and yourself.

Builds a working map of cells, tissues, organs, body planes, common medical terms, and how body systems connect. This gives you the language needed for assessment and care plans.

Covers fluid balance, electrolytes, dehydration, edema, pH, shock, and why small changes can become emergencies. You will connect intake, output, labs, symptoms, and nursing actions.

Teaches the heart, blood vessels, lungs, oxygen exchange, perfusion, and common warning signs. You will connect breathing, circulation, pulse, blood pressure, and oxygen saturation.

Covers the brain, spinal cord, nerves, senses, consciousness, movement, seizures, stroke signs, and pain pathways. You will practice neuro checks and notice changes that need fast response.

Teaches digestion, nutrition, liver function, blood sugar, hormones, and metabolism. You will connect meals, medications, labs, nausea, bowel patterns, and endocrine problems.

Covers kidney function, urine production, fluid regulation, reproductive anatomy, menstruation, pregnancy basics, and common urinary concerns. You will connect output, labs, symptoms, and patient comfort.

Teaches immunity, inflammation, allergies, wound healing, cancer growth, and how the body responds to injury. You will recognize patterns such as fever, swelling, fatigue, and abnormal cell growth.

Covers growth, development, aging, disability, frailty, and how care changes across the lifespan. You will adapt communication, safety, medication concerns, and family support to the person’s stage of life.

Builds the foundation of pathology: how injury, infection, genetics, poor perfusion, inflammation, and organ failure change normal function. You will connect disease mechanisms to symptoms and nursing priorities.

Teaches inspection, palpation, percussion, auscultation, focused assessments, and head-to-toe assessment flow. You will practice gathering patient data in a calm, organized way.

Covers clear charting, objective language, time stamps, late entries, incident notes, and why documentation is a legal record. You will practice writing notes that another nurse can safely act on.

Teaches nursing diagnoses, goals, interventions, rationales, and evaluation. You will turn assessment findings into a care plan that can guide a real shift.

Covers bathing, oral care, toileting, positioning, sleep, comfort measures, and preserving independence. You will practice helping without taking over what the patient can still do.

Teaches fall prevention, pressure injury prevention, safe transfers, restraints rules, alarm use, and environmental safety checks. You will build habits that prevent harm before it starts.

Covers diet orders, swallowing safety, feeding assistance, intake tracking, enteral tubes, nausea, and malnutrition risk. You will connect food, fluids, dignity, and recovery.

Teaches wound assessment, dressings, drains, bleeding, infection signs, pressure injuries, and surgical incision care. You will practice choosing safe actions based on what the wound shows.

Covers medication orders, the rights of medication administration, dosage checks, routes, side effects, allergies, high-alert drugs, and medication reconciliation. You will practice giving medicines safely from order to follow-up.

Teaches peripheral IVs, fluids, tubing, pumps, compatibility checks, infiltration, phlebitis, central line precautions, and infusion documentation. You will connect infusion therapy to safety checks at the bedside.

Covers specimen collection, common labs, cultures, imaging preparation, point-of-care testing, and critical values. You will practice connecting test results to symptoms and next nursing actions.

Teaches nasal cannulas, masks, nebulizers, suctioning, incentive spirometry, tracheostomy care, CPAP/BiPAP support, and ventilator safety basics. You will practice helping patients breathe while watching for deterioration.

Covers pain assessment, non-drug comfort measures, opioids, sedatives, controlled-substance handling, prescription order types, waste rules, and respiratory depression risk. You will balance relief, safety, and legal accountability.

Teaches early warning signs, rapid response calls, airway-breathing-circulation priorities, BLS, sepsis alerts, stroke alerts, code roles, and post-event care. You will practice acting quickly while staying within scope.

Follows a real nursing shift from report, safety checks, assessments, medication timing, interruptions, priorities, charting, and final handoff. You will practice organizing work when many needs compete at once.

Follows patient movement through admission, transfer, discharge teaching, medication reconciliation, equipment needs, follow-up appointments, and barriers at home. You will practice closing gaps that often cause readmission.

Covers scope of practice, nurse practice acts, state boards of nursing, licensure, NCLEX, continuing education, accountability, and civil, criminal, and professional consequences. You will know where nursing authority begins and ends.

Teaches delegation to nursing assistants and licensed practical or vocational nurses, supervision, task matching, communication, and follow-up. You will practice assigning work without giving away responsibility.

Covers informed consent, refusal of care, confidentiality limits, mandated reporting, notifiable diseases, abuse reporting, adverse events, death documentation, organ donation steps, and chain of custody. You will know which duties require immediate action.

Teaches ethical principles through bedside conflicts: autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence, justice, truth-telling, moral distress, cultural humility, and professional boundaries. You will practice naming the conflict and choosing the safest next step.

Covers research questions, study types, bias, statistics in plain language, clinical guidelines, and applying evidence to one patient. You will judge whether a practice is tradition, policy, evidence, or opinion.

Teaches root cause analysis, near-miss reporting, safety culture, checklists, audits, PDSA cycles, and quality measures. You will practice improving a system instead of blaming one person.

Covers physicians, pharmacists, therapists, social workers, case managers, dietitians, chaplains, and interpreters. You will practice rounds, SBAR, closed-loop communication, and speaking up when something is unsafe.

Teaches common adult conditions across cardiac, respiratory, renal, GI, endocrine, neuro, and infectious problems. You will connect assessment, medications, mobility, nutrition, teaching, and discharge planning for complex adult patients.

Covers pre-op checks, informed consent verification, sterile fields, anesthesia risks, intra-op nursing roles, PACU priorities, and post-op complications. You will follow the patient safely before, during, and after surgery.

Teaches triage, trauma priorities, chest pain, stroke, overdose, psychiatric crisis, disaster surge, and fast reassessment. You will practice making safe decisions with limited time and incomplete information.

Covers ICU monitoring, shock, ventilators, vasoactive drips, sedation, delirium, lines, bundles, and family support. You will connect advanced technology to close bedside assessment.

Teaches prenatal care, labor support, fetal monitoring basics, birth, postpartum assessment, breastfeeding support, newborn transition, and warning signs. You will care for two patients whose needs are tightly connected.

Covers pediatric growth, family-centered care, weight-based medication safety, respiratory illness, dehydration, fever, developmental concerns, and pediatric emergencies. You will adjust nursing care for children rather than treating them like small adults.

Teaches therapeutic boundaries, suicide risk, substance use, withdrawal, trauma-informed care, psychiatric medications, restraints and seclusion rules, and crisis communication. You will practice keeping patients safe while preserving dignity.

Covers dementia, delirium, polypharmacy, falls, frailty, continence, nutrition, long-term care, elder abuse, and caregiver strain. You will protect independence while recognizing age-related risks.

Teaches immunizations, screening, outbreak control, home visits, health teaching, environmental risks, and social drivers of health. You will connect individual care to community health patterns.

Covers diabetes, heart failure, COPD, kidney disease, hypertension, asthma, and patient self-management. You will practice coaching, monitoring, medication adherence, and realistic plans for daily life.

Teaches cancer treatments, side effects, neutropenic precautions, symptom control, goals-of-care conversations, hospice, and comfort at the end of life. You will balance treatment, relief, family needs, and patient wishes.

Covers stroke recovery, spinal cord injury, amputations, mobility aids, bowel and bladder programs, therapy goals, and independence training. You will help patients regain function and adapt to new limits.

Teaches care in homes, skilled nursing facilities, and hospital-at-home programs, including safety checks, family teaching, equipment, escalation plans, and reimbursement pressures. You will practice nursing when the “unit” is someone’s living space.

Covers electronic health records, medication administration records, order sets, inboxes, alerts, interoperability, privacy, downtime procedures, and avoiding copy-forward harm. You will use digital tools without letting clicks replace judgment.

Teaches barcode medication administration, smart pumps, automated dispensing cabinets, bed alarms, clinical monitors, and device integration. You will use technology as a safety layer while still checking the patient yourself.

Covers video visits, virtual nursing, remote triage, digital consent, privacy, state practice rules, and when virtual care is not enough. You will practice safe nursing judgment when the patient is not in the same room.

Teaches home blood pressure cuffs, glucose monitors, pulse oximeters, weight scales, wearables, implantable device data, alert fatigue, and escalation protocols. You will turn streams of home data into useful care decisions.

Covers clinical decision support, sepsis alerts, predictive risk scores, ambient documentation, AI chat tools, bias, privacy, verification, and nurse accountability. You will use AI as support, not as a substitute for nursing judgment.

Teaches family history, pharmacogenomics, cancer genetics, newborn screening, genetic privacy, referrals, and patient teaching. You will know when genetic information changes nursing care and when a specialist is needed.

Covers nursing data, dashboards, quality measures, informatics roles, data governance, clinical terminology, and workflow design. You will see how bedside charting becomes staffing decisions, safety reports, and policy.

Teaches staffing models, acuity, assignments, charge nurse decisions, conflict handling, coaching, just culture, burnout risk, and safe escalation. You will practice leading a team while protecting patients and coworkers.

Covers disaster triage, pandemics, workplace violence, needlestick injuries, hazardous drugs, radiation precautions, crisis standards, and personal preparedness. You will protect yourself and keep care going when conditions are unstable.

Covers nursing roles, specialties, ADN and BSN paths, graduate practice options, certifications such as BLS, ACLS, PALS, CCRN, CEN, and proof-of-skill artifacts like clinical portfolios and preceptor feedback. You will plan how to enter the field, grow responsibly, and stay current with boards, journals, policies, and professional groups.