Glossary

Author: Glossary

  • Occupational health

    An area of specialization in health care which concerns the factors (such as working conditions and exposure to hazardous materials) in an occupation that influence the health of workers in that occupation, and which is concerned generally with the prevention of disease and injury and the maintenance of fitness (because these factors are important in…

  • Occasion of service

    A specific act of service provided a patient, such as a test or procedure.  

  • Nutrition assessment

    Determining the nutritional status of an individual or a group through physical, biochemical, or dietary intake indicators.  

  • Nutriceutical

    Nutrients which are alleged or proven to be active in preventing or treating disease. Vitamins, minerals, herbal remedies, and other supplements are the major classes of such products. Examples, with some of the claims made for them, are beta-carotene (prevention of cancer); fish oils, niacin, oat bran (prevention of heart disease); fiber-based appetite suppressants (weight…

  • Nurturing

    The provision of nourishment. In health care, the nourishment under consideration is that required for the mental, spiritual, emotional, and social wellbeing of the patient and family as well as their physical well-being. The topic is getting increasing attention as hospital stays are becoming shorter and hospitalization is often being avoided altogether; the nurturing formerly…

  • Nursing services

    Those services normally provided by nurses, including personal care, administration of drugs and other medications and treatments, assessment of patients’ needs and care requirements, and preparation of care plans for individual patients. Nurse practice acts (laws) in the various states place limitations on the tasks (for example, administration of intravenous medication) which can be performed…

  • Nursing service administrator

    A registered nurse (RN) responsible for the overall administration and management of nursing services in a hospital. It is the highest nursing position in the hospital. The nursing service administrator may have the title ‘Vice-president for nursing” or some similar title. The former title was “nursing director.”  

  • Nonprofit

    An entity whose profits (excess of income over expenses) are used for its own purposes rather than returned to its members (shareholders, investors, owners) as dividends. To qualify for tax exemption, no portion of the profits of the entity may “inure” to the benefit of an individual.  

  • Nonfederal

    Not owned or operated by the federal government.  

  • Nominal group technique

    A process developed by Delbecq, Van de Ven, and Gustafson for “increasing the creative productivity of group action, facilitating group decisions…and saving human effort and energy…” A nominal group is a group “in name only,” a type of group in which individuals are together but do not talk or interact until late in the NGT…