Middle Range Theory: Symptom Management Theory

Middle Range Theory Paper
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Middle Range Theory Paper
Introduction
There is a rising interest in middle-range theory application anchored on a growing number of published theories and the desire amongst researchers and nursing professionals to employ theories at the mid-range level to guide research and practice. Middle-range theories constitute a combination of related concepts emphasizing a constrained dimension of nursing realities. These theories comprise suggested relationships and concepts among the fundamental ideas demonstrated within a model. Middle-range theory development and growth happen at the practice and research intersection to guide routine scholarly inquiry and practice based on the nursing discipline. This paper evaluates the symptom management theory to understand its development, purpose, assumptions, and critical concepts and propositions. The report also includes a critique and reflection on the usefulness of the theory in nursing practice.
Development and Purpose
The capacity of a theory to inform nursing practice or care process is tailored to provide a scientific basis for nursing actions and clinical practice. It also contributes to the expansion as well as the development of credible nursing information and related clinical practice improvement as a science and profession. In this context, to guide clinical inquiry into the clinical practice and manifestations in health care delivery, nurses, investigators, and the Symptom Management Teachers Group stakeholders at the San Francisco’s California University School of Nursing designed and issued a theoretical framework illustrating the symptom management multi-dimensional processes – the Symptom Management Model (SMM) – designed based on the basis that practical clinical manifestations or symptom cluster management must take into account three components: symptom management techniques, outcomes, and symptom experience (Silva et al., 2021).
The model was revised in 2001 to include a symptom management procedure within the nursing science domains contexts: the environment, the health, the person, and the illness. In 2008, the model was updated and conceptualized as a medium-range theory referred to as the Symptom Management Theory (SMT). This theory defines a symptom as a subjective experience reflecting a person’s biopsychosocial sensations, functions, or cognitions. The model also defines the signs as abnormalities indicative of an illness. Considering the above definitions, the SMT researchers emphasized how vital the clinical manifestations were and could offer indications regarding an individual’s condition to appraise them and management techniques to lessen the manifestations. In this way, SMT’s purpose is to guide nursing practice via a systematic and subjective appraisal of signs and symptoms, planning and selecting interventions and their assessments. It is also tailored to guide clinical research by contributing specific assumptions and questions for managing symptoms (Silva et al., 2021). According to Eckerblad et al. (2020), symptom management efforts are tailored to delay or prevent the negat...