Yulin Chu, N.P.

The metaparadigm of nursing distinguishes nursing from any other discipline such as biology, sociology, or psychology (Jonson et al., 2012).  Initial consensus on the metaparadigm concepts in nursing was proposed by Fawcett in 1984. According to Fawcett (1984), metaparadigm, as the central concepts of nursing, contains person, environment, health, and nursing. These four concepts represent the phenomena of interest to nursing discipline, which are under the umbrella of nursing metaparadigm.

The two major distinguished paradigms are totality and simultaneity paradigms in nursing. The totality paradigm views man as a mechanistic organism who is seen as a sum of parts. The simultaneity paradigm sees man as more than the sum of his parts as a holistic and integrated organism, changing simultaneously with his environment (Johnson et al., 2012). These two paradigms represent fundamentally distinct worldviews in their central concepts of person, environment, health, and nursing.  They also adopt different frameworks and develop different nursing models.  However, they also have some similarities: They both seek a way forward through new paradigm approaches, and they view such notions as caring and experience of health and illness as central concepts. Some theorists believe that diversity is healthy, and a new worldview of nursing will emerge from the interaction of these different paradigms (Fawcett, 1984).

In psychiatric nursing practice, because of the vulnerability of the patients with mental disorders, neither of biomedical and phenomenological perspectives is adequate to frame a person-centred approach of nursing care (Penrod, et al., 2007). In contrast, the person-centered care represents a simultaneity paradigm of nursing component, which emphasis the idea of the person is the dimension of wholeness. 

References

Fawcett, J. (1984). The metaparadigm of nursing: Present status and future refinements. The Journal of   Nursing Scholarship, 16, 3: 84-87.
Jonson, D., Abdella, F., Orlando, D., Videnbach, E., King, I., Peplau, H., Hall, L., & Orem, D. (2012). Nursing theory – history and modernity. Prominent theories of nursing. Retrieved from: http://intranet.tdmu.edu.ua/data/kafedra/internal/magistr/classes_stud
Penrod, J., Yu, F., Kolanowski, A., Fick, D. M., Loeb, S. J., & Hupcey, J. E. (2007). Reframing Person-Centered Nursing Care for persons with dementia. Research and Theory for Nursing Practice, 21(1): 57–72.