Nursing Interventions: Examples and Overview

What do wound care, medication administration, fall prevention measures, and education all have in common? They’re nursing interventions — tasks that nursing professionals perform to help patients complete care goals. Let’s go over what they are, how they’re classified, and some examples to guide your practice.

Interventions are an essential part of the nursing process, a standardized workflow that nurses use to develop and carry out patient care. The steps of the nursing process include the following:

1. Assessment
2. Diagnosis
3. Planning
4. Implementation/intervention
5. Evaluation

What Is a Nursing Intervention?

A nursing intervention is an action that a nursing professional makes on behalf of a patient as part of their care plan. A nurse’s role is broad — in any given shift, you might be a patient educator, medication manager, advocate, and coach for a single patient. Nursing care interventions encompass the varied, dynamic roles of nurses themselves.

Within the steps of the nursing process, specific diagnoses are linked to certain nursing interventions. NANDA nursing diagnoses may make recommendations for interventions, but it’s up to you to use critical thinking to form unique plans of care for each patient. And any nursing intervention you implement should be documented in the electronic health record (EHR).

Nursing Intervention Classification (NIC)

Think about all the tasks you do in a shift — there are a lot of ways that nurses can impact patients. Developed by the University of Iowa College of Nursing, the NIC system organizes interventions hierarchically into 30 classes within seven domains. Most of the interventions within the NIC are for individual patients, but some are for families, and others can be applied to the broader community.

7 Domains

1. Behavioral interventions support psychosocial functioning, coping, and healthy behavior patterns.
2. Community interventions aim to improve health within a population or group.
3. Family interventions focus on the health and function of caregivers and the family unit.
4. Health system interventions are organizational or administrative, such as discharge planning.
5. Physiological (basic) interventions refer to essential physical care tasks and activities of daily living.
6. Physiological (complex) interventions are more advanced interventions that address complex needs, such as glucose management and hemodynamic regulation.
7. Safety interventions prevent injury or complications.

Additionally, interventions can also be grouped by their place within the nursing scope of practice. Here are the categories:

• Independent nursing interventions can be performed by the nurse without supervision or additional orders. For example, a nurse caring for a postoperative patient may educate and encourage them to use the incentive spirometer to prevent atelectasis.
• Dependent nursing interventions require verification or additional orders from a medical provider. If a patient reports unmanaged pain despite their prescribed NSAID, the nurse may contact the provider to ask for another medication on the patient’s behalf.
• Interdependent interventions require effort from the healthcare team at large. For example, the nurse may advocate to coordinate a care meeting for a patient whose family is considering hospice.

3 Examples of Nursing Diagnoses and Interventions

1. Nursing Interventions for Acute Pain

Maria, a 45-year-old woman, is admitted to a med-surg unit following an open cholecystectomy. She grimaces when moving in bed and rates her abdominal pain as an 8 out of 10. As Maria’s nurse, you might implement the following interventions for acute pain:

• Assess pain level regularly using a validated pain scale.
• Administer prescribed analgesics and monitor for effectiveness.
• Inform Maria of when she can receive her PRN pain medication again, and write the time on her whiteboard.
• Use non-pharmacological techniques such as heat/cold therapy and relaxation.
• Encourage Maria to report pain early before it becomes severe.

2. Hypertension Nursing Interventions

James, a 60-year-old man with a history of hypertension, presents to an outpatient clinic with blood pressure readings over 150/90 mmHg. He admits he has skipped taking his medication for the last few days and has not been following his dietitian’s recommendations to lower his sodium intake. As James’ nurse, you might take the following courses of action:

• Alert the provider about James’ blood pressure readings.
• Ensure that James has a home blood pressure monitor and knows how to use it.
• Provide James with educational materials about the DASH diet.
• Encourage medication adherence and explain the purpose of each of his medications.
• Ask James why he is struggling to make dietary changes to see if additional interventions can be made.

3. Nursing Interventions for Impaired Gas Exchange

Linda, a 72-year-old woman with COPD, is admitted with shortness of breath and low oxygen saturation. She appears anxious and is using accessory muscles to breathe. As her nurse in the emergency department, you take the following actions:

• Position Linda in high Fowler’s position to maximize lung expansion.
• Monitor her respiratory rate, oxygen saturation, and breath sounds frequently.
• Administer supplemental oxygen as ordered.
• Encourage coughing, deep breathing exercises, and the use of an incentive spirometer.

To see a more in-depth example of nursing care interventions, view our guide on interventions for dementia.

Nursing Intervention FAQ

What’s the difference between nursing and medical interventions?

Nursing care interventions are part of the nursing process and pertain to nursing diagnoses. They’re focused on improving patient’s response to disease based on their care goals. Medical interventions, on the other hand, aim to treat medical diagnoses, which are established using diagnostic tests, lab values, and other criteria.

For example, a patient may be diagnosed with COPD by their primary care provider and receive a CPAP machine as part of their medical plan of care. The same patient may have a nursing diagnosis of sleep disturbance related to COPD, and an appropriate nursing intervention may be encouraging a nightly routine and creating a quiet, calm nighttime environment.

How are nursing care interventions documented?

Document interventions in the patient’s care plan and progress notes using standardized terminology, such as the NIC. Common interventions, such as fall risk precautions, may populate as standard order sets within certain EHRs, such as Epic.

How do I choose the right intervention for my patient?

If you’re a newer nurse, or just newer to your specialty, it’s normal to feel like you don’t know how to plan your interventions. The nursing process is designed to help you, so be sure you’ve completed your assessment and selected nursing diagnoses based on your findings. Use these resources to guide your planning:

• NANDA-I nursing diagnoses: Use the NANDA list to formulate diagnoses, which may include defining characteristics and related factors to point you toward appropriate interventions.
• NIC: This classification system is a great place to find standardized language and specific interventions for each diagnosis.
• Facility protocols: Many hospitals and clinics provide care pathways or order sets aligned with common diagnoses, which include interventions that nurses are expected to initiate.
• Collaborate: Ask other nurses, preceptors, or interdisciplinary team members for input. Care planning is a team effort.

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