Commendations: a resource intervention for clinical practice

Nurses form collaborative relationships with patients and families to provide care and to assist families in dealing with health problems. Commendations is one intervention nurses can use to empower patients and families in order to enhance the forming and maintenance of a collaborative relationship. Commendations are statements of special praise that are specific to some aspect of patient and/or family functioning. The focus of this paper is the use of commendations in clinical practice. The theoretical orientation that informs the use of commendations is family systems nursing, which highlights family resources. A practical approach to the content, process, and timing of commendations is presented, and the use of commendations in practice is illustrated by example.