Litchfield, M., & Noroian, E. (1989). Changes in selected pulmonary functions in patients diagnosed with myasthenia gravis. Journal of Neuroscience – Nursing, 21(6), 375–381.
Abstract: Patients with myisthenia gravis (MG) face major pulmary problems as a part of the disease process. In this descriptive study, changes in selected pulmonary functions (respiratory rate, negative inspiratory force, tidal volume and forced total capacity) in 14 patients diagnosed with mild or moderate MG were measured every two hours from 8.00 a.m. to 8.00 p.m. Females comprised 64% of the sample while 36% were males. All subjects received anticholnesterase medication, and some subjects received additional treatment modalities. Most of the subjects were non-smokers or previous smokers, but two subjects continued to smoke. Ninety-three recent of the sample had forced vital capacities less than 60% of their predicted values. Myasthenic forced vital capacities were significantly lower (p=.0000) than those predicted for normal subjects. The inspiratory force for the sample was low sat 8:00 a.m. as well as in females over 55 years of age. There was a wide variation in total volume to normal values derived from random tables and predicted equations ws not significant. Th major implications from this study are the need to assess pulmonary function in the hospitalized myasthenic every two hours, and the need for a program of coughing, deep breathing and sighing after medication administration when the muscles are strongest
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Litchfield, M. (2005). The nursing praxis of family health. In Picard, C & Jones, D., Giving voice to what we know (pp.73-82). Boston, Massachusetts, USA: Jones & Bartlett.
Abstract: The chapter explores the process of nursing practice and how it contributes to health, derived from research undertaken in New Zealand. It presents the nature of nursing research as if practice – the researcher as if practitioner – establishing a foundation for the development of nursing knowledge that would make a distinct contribution to health and health care. It includes the philosophy and practicalities of nursing through the use of a case study of nursing a family with complex health circumstances.
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Litchfield, M. (1999). Practice wisdom. Advances in Nursing Science, 22(2), 62–73.
Abstract: The paper is the report of two cumulative research projects studying the nature of nursing knowledge and methodology to develop it. They were undertaken as theses for masters and doctoral degrees at the University of Minnesota, USA. Nursing knowledge is depicted as relational: an evolving participatory process of research-as-if-practice of which 'health' (its meaning), dialogue, partnership and pattern recognition are threads inter-related around personal values of vision and community.
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Jonsdottir, H., Litchfield, M., & Pharris, M. (). The relational core of nursing practice as partnership. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 47(3), 241–250.
Abstract: This article elaborates the meaning of partnership in practice for nurses practising in different and complementary way to nurses in specialist roles and medical practitioners. It positions partnership as the relational core of nursing practice. Partnership is presented as an evolving dialogue between nurse and patient, which is characterised by open, caring, mutually responsive and non-directive approaches. This partnership occurs within a health system that is dominated by technologically-driven, prescriptive, and outcome-oriented approaches. It is the second of a series of articles written as a partnership between nurse scholars from Iceland, NZ and USA.
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van Wissen, K. A., Litchfield, M., & Maling, T. (1998). Living with high blood pressure. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 27(3), 567–574.
Abstract: An interdisciplinary (nursing-medicine) collaboration in a qualitative descriptive research project undertaken in the Wellington School of Medicine with New Zealand Health Research Council funding. The purpose was to inform the practice of nursing and medical practitioners. A group of patients were interviewed in their homes. Their experience of having a diagnosis of hypertension and prescription of long-term treatment requiring adjustment in their lives and the lives of their families is presented as themes.
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Litchfield, M. (1986). Thinking through diagnosis: Process in nursing practice. Nursing Praxis in New Zealand, 1(4), 9–12.
Abstract: A paper following on from the paper “Between the idea and reality” (Nursing Praxis in New Zealand 1(2), 17-29) proposing the focus for the discipline of nursing – practice and research – is diagnosis. For nursing practice, diagnosis is a practice that collapses “The Nursing Process”; for research to develop nursing practice, diagnosis is one continuous relational process that merges and makes the separate tasks od assessment, intervention and evaluation redundant.
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Litchfield, M. (1989). Knowledge embedded in practice. Kai Tiaki: Nursing New Zealand, 82(10), 24–25.
Abstract: A statement of the nature of research needed to distinguish the knowledge of nursing practice from knowledge developed by other disciplines. It orients to the interrelationship of practice and research as the foundation of the discipline of nursing.
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Litchfield, M. (1991). Nursing education: Direction with purpose. Kai Tiaki: Nursing New Zealand, 84(7), 22–24.
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Litchfield, M. (1992). Computers and the form of nursing to come. International Journal of Health Informatics, 1(1), 7–10.
Abstract: An invited paper for the initial issue of the IJHI. Adapted from a paper presented at the annual conference of Nursing Informatics New Zealand, 1991 (subsequently incorporated into the collective organisation, Health Informatics, NZ.
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Litchfield, M., & Laws, M. (1999). Achieving family health and cost-containment outcomes: Innovation in the New Zealand Health Sector Reforms. In Cohen,E. & De Back,V. (Eds.), The outcomes mandate: New roles, rules and relationships. Case management in health care today (pp. 306-316). St Louis: Mosby.
Abstract: The chapter presents the research findings of the 1992-1993 Wellington Nurse Case Management Scheme Project as a distinct model of nurse case management, which introduced a role and form of practice of a family nurse and a diagram of the service delivery structure required for support and relevant for the New Zealand health system reforms.
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Jonsdottir, H., Litchfield, M., & Pharris, M. (2003). Partnership in practice. Research & Theory for Nursing Practice, 17(1), 51–63.
Abstract: This article presents a reconsideration of partnership between nurse and client as the core of the nursing discipline. It points to the significance of the relational nature of partnership, differentiating its features and form from the prevalent understanding associated with prescriptive interventions to achieve predetermined goals and outcomes. The meaning of partnership is presented within the nursing process where the caring presence of the nurse becomes integral to the health experience of the client as the potential for action. Exemplars provide illustration of this emerging view in practice and research. This is the first of a series of articles written as a partnership between nurse scholars from Iceland, New Zealand and the USA. The series draws on research projects that explored the philosophical, theoretical, ethical and practical nature of nursing practice and its significance for health and healthcare in a world of changing need.
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Litchfield, M., & Jonsdottir, H. (2008). A practice discipline that's here and now. Advances in Nursing Science, 31(1), 79–92.
Abstract: The article is a collaborative writing venture drawing on research findings from New Zealand and Iceland to contribute to the international scholarship on the status and future direction of the nursing discipline. It takes an overview of the international historical trends in nursing knowledge development and proposes a framework for contemporary nursing research that accommodates the past efforts and paradigms of nurse scholars and reflects the changing thinking around the humanness of the health circumstance as the focus of the nursing discipline. It addresses contemporary challenges facing nurses as practitioners and researchers for advancement of practice and delivery of health services, and for influencing health policy.
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Litchfield, M. (1992). The nation's health and our response. (Vol. Keynote address at the 1992 NERF/NZNZ National Nur).
Abstract: An analysis of the challenges for the nursing profession of the Government's health reforms. The findings of the 10-month Wellington Nurse Case Management Project 1991-1992, including the description of family nursing practice, what it achieved for health and the service delivery model that would position family nurses in the health reforms were used to provide an exemplar for the nuyrising contribution to health policy for the health reforms. The paper identified a vacum for the reorientating of health care provision to patients/clients and health need and the call to nursesw to take leadership in goving direction to the reorientation.
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Litchfield, M. (1986). Between the idea and reality. Nursing Praxis in New Zealand, 1(2), 17–29.
Abstract: A paper presented as one of the four “Winter Lecture Series” hosted by the Nursing Studies unit of the Department of Education, Victoria University of Wellington. It is a critique of “ The Nursing Process” referred to commonly in nursing education programmes. It challenges the usefulness for nursing of the linear sequence of steps of assessment, diagnosis, planning, intervention and evaluation.
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Litchfield, M. (1993). Priorities for research. kai Tiaki: Nursing New Zealand, 1(8), 28–30.
Abstract: An article adapted from the author's contribution as an invited member of the International Panel of Nurse Researchers leading the Special Research Seminar of the 1993 International Council of Nurses Quadrennial Congress, Madrid, Spain. The priorities of nursing research in New Zealand were derived from the findings of a semi-structured survey of the opinions of nurses in academic settings.
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