significant statements
This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Shanghai Pulmonary Hospital, Affiliated to Tongji University, project number: K16-252. Before the interview, the researcher explained the purpose and significance of the study to each interviewee in detail and obtained the informed consent of them on a voluntary basis and all of the interviewees signed informed consent forms. To protect the privacy of each interviewee, their names are replaced by numbers (e.g., N1, N2), and the original materials and transcribed text materials involved are kept by the first author himself, and all materials are destroyed after the completion of the study.
There was no new point of view when the 13th nurse was interviewed, and there was still no new point of view when one more nurse was interviewed, the interview was over, 14 nurses were interviewed. Three themes and seven subthemes were extracted. The characteristics of the participants ( N = 14) are provided in Table II .
Participant characteristics (N = 14).
Characteristics | (%) or M ± SD; range | |
---|---|---|
Age (years) | 30.29 ± 8.49;22 ~ 48 | |
Working years | 9.71 ± 9.25; 1 ~ 29 | |
Gender | ||
Male | 1(7.14%) | |
Female | 13 (92.86%) | |
Educational level | ||
Junior college student | 4 (28.57) | |
Undergraduate student | 10 (71.43%) | |
Professional title | ||
Junior nurse | 8 (57.14%) | |
Nurse Practitioner | 1 (7.14%) | |
Nurse-in-charge | 4 (28.57%) | |
Associate Professor of nursing | 1 (7.14%) | |
Marital status | ||
Married | 6 (42.86%) | |
Unmarried | 8 (57.14%) | |
Department | ||
Department of infectious diseases | 3 (21.43%) | |
Medical department | 6 (42.86%) | |
Intensive care unit | 3(21.43%) | |
Surgical department | 2 ()14.29% |
Differences in knowledge structure and thinking.
Differences in the structure of prior knowledge and way of thinking will affect nurses’ processing of clinical data, thus affecting their clinical decision-making. The nurses made a wrong judgement of the condition because of the solidified thinking that postoperative nausea and vomiting symptoms were side effects of narcotic drugs and the lack of overall control and understanding of the patient’s condition.
There was a patient who came back after surgery with nausea and vomiting, the first thing that went through my mind, is the drug side effects, so I didn’t pay much attention, as is often the case, the most common cause of postoperative nausea and vomiting is anesthetic drug side effects, but later found to be cerebral infarction, this kind of situation I find it hard to recognize.
Professional values of nurses are accepted codes of conduct internalized by nursing professionals through training and learning (Pan, 2016 ). Negative professional values are easy to lead to problem solving dilemma. Some nurses think nursing is just a service.
The work is difficult to do, everything is the nurse’s fault, the nurse must apologize and put up with the patient’s scolding, nursing is a service industry, sometimes I am really wronged.” There are also nurses who believe that nursing work can reflect their personal value, and solving problems successfully will bring them a sense of achievement.
Although the nursing work is very intense, I live a full life every day. I feel a sense of accomplishment and pride that I can solve the problems of patients and discharge them smoothly through my work.
Nursing work is patient-centred holistic nursing, the current clinical situation is complex and changeable, requiring nurses must have good strain capacity, and can “be anxious about what the patient needs, think what the patient thinks, and solve the patient’s difficulties.”
All patients are self-centered, and they don’t care whether you (the nurse) are busy or not. For example, once I gave oral medicine to a patient, a patient in the same ward was in a hurry and asked me to help him call his son. I was busy handing out the medicine and did not help. As a result, the patient was very dissatisfied and complained to the head nurse.
The 20-bed patient went through the discharge formalities but was still lying in the hospital bed. when the new patient arrived and she didn’t leave, I went to urge her to leave the hospital, she suddenly got angry and scolded me, I don’t know what to do.
Low sense of organizational support.
Organizational support is an important resource for clinical nurses in the process of problem solving (Poghosyan et al., 2020 ). Low sense of organizational support will hinder nurses’ problem solving.
The style of leadership and the atmosphere of the department are very important. in a department I rotated before, the leader was too strict to listen to your explanation, and the atmosphere of the department was not good. I couldn’t find help when I encountered problems. When I have a conflict with a patient, the leader will only criticize me, which makes me feel helpless.
Sometimes there will be a conflict with patients due to the bed turnover problem, and the patient will not listen to your explanation and turn around to complain, the nurse will be responsible for such things. In severe cases, even violent incidents will be encountered and the personal safety can not be guaranteed.
Although the total number of nurses has increased substantially, there is still a shortage of human resources under the rapidly increasing workload (Guo et al., 2021 ).
When I was on the night shift and I encountered the critical moment of rescuing patients, I had to call an anesthesiologist, a doctor on duty, a nurse on duty simultaneously, an observation of the patient’s condition to prevent accidents was needed, I also have to race against time to give the patient ECG monitoring and oxygen inhalation. When the doctor came, he also criticized me that the first-aid equipment was not in place (crying).
According to the normal nurse-patient ratio, each nurse takes care of eight patients, and now there are not only eight patients, but also with extra beds and a fast turnover, and sometimes a nurse is responsible for more than 12 patients
The concept of emphasizing medicine and neglecting to nurse.
There is a deviation in society’s cognition of the profession of nurses, which believes that nurses are the “legs” of doctors, and nurses’ work is to help doctors run errands, give injections and give fluids. This concept not only leads to nurses’ lack of due respect, but also hinders nurses’ professional identity, and has a great negative impact on nurses’ problem-solving (Gao et al., 2015 ).
The patient did not dare to tell the doctor something he was not satisfied with, but complained directly to the nurse. For example, if the patient did not want to do some tests, he would scold the nurse. The nurse explained to him that he would not listen. But when the doctor came, he smiled and refused to admit that he cursed nurses, and he would frame the nurse. 90% of the patients would be willing to listen to the doctor.
Sometimes the patient says he was not feeling well, and I know the patient’s condition. I will give her some reasonable explanations, but the patient does not accept it. She is satisfied only when the doctor come to see her. In the final analysis, the patient just don’t believe us. No matter how much I explain to her, it is not as effective as the doctor’s glance at her.
There are differences in patients’ personality characteristics, cultural background, views on nurses and state of an illness, these individual differences are also the reasons for nurses’ problem-solving dilemma (Chan et al., 2018 ).
Some cancer patients are in a period of anger, and it is very difficult to communicate with him. When I see him angry and lose his temper, I will not talk to him and just leave.”
Patients have different cultural levels and different social backgrounds. Sometimes I can’t talk too deeply. If patients are a little more educated, it will be easier for us to communicate with them, and some patients can’t understand anything we say.”
The reasons for nurses’ failure in problem solving are mainly in the process of understanding the problem, the search process driven by the psychological information structure, and the problem or loss of balance in the process of implementing the plan. In the process, the three factors of nurses, management and patients all played an important role. Nurses’ knowledge structure and thinking loopholes led to the deviation of nurses’ internal representation of the problem (Jonassen, 2005 ). Poor professional values and low sense of organizational support can lead to nurses’ negative orientation and attitude towards problems (Poghosyan et al., 2020 ; X. Wang et al., 2018 ). The manpower allocation of nurses, patients’ emphasis on medical treatment over nursing care, and individual differences mainly increase the complexity and difficulty of nurses’ problem-solving task environment as external factors. The three factors work together on the problem-solving of clinical nurses, which leads to the dilemma of problem-solving.
At present, the overall quality and ability of nurses cannot meet the requirements of systematic, effective and rapid problem-solving. It is necessary to strengthen the construction of nurses to improve nurses’ problem-solving ability. Some studies have shown that situational simulation class can improve students’ knowledge, experience, psychological quality and other abilities (Mohammad, 2020 ). It is suggested that nursing educators should explore targeted situational simulation teaching and strengthen the relationship between classroom teaching and clinical practice through situational simulation, and to build a novel, perfect and clinical knowledge network for nurses. Secondly, emergency situational simulation teaching should be carried out to enable nurses to experience emergency situations from different angles, so as to improve their thinking, skills and timeliness in dealing with emergencies (Zhang et al., 2019 ). The content of professional values training should also be added to the situational simulation class in order to cultivate nurses’ positive, accessible and stable professional values and promote their positive orientation and attitude when facing problems (Skeriene, 2019 ).
Through interviews, it is found that nursing management factors have caused nurses’ problem-solving dilemma to a certain extent, which needs to be optimized according to the specific problems existing in nursing management to help nurses deal with the problems and solve the dilemma effectively. The total number of registered nurses in China exceeded 4.7 million in 2021, an increase of 1.46 million from 3.24 million in 2015, an increase of 45% (Deng et al., 2019 ]. However, there is still a large workload and underallocation of manpower, which may be due to the unreasonable distribution of human resources between time periods and departments. Hospitals and nursing managers can use the hospital information system to evaluate the nursing workload, and allocate nursing human resources reasonably according to the evaluation results (H. Yang et al., 2019 ), so as to avoid nurses falling into the dilemma of problem solving due to long-term overloaded work. In addition, it is necessary to create a harmonious departmental atmosphere for nurses, create a supportive departmental environment (Aghaei et al., 2020 ), and strictly ensure the safety of nurses’ practice and put an end to the occurrence of violence. Timely and strong organizational support can reduce the painful feelings of nurses caused by adverse events (Stone, 2020 ). and help them to solve problems actively.
There is a bias in social cognition of the profession of nurses, and some negative media reports mislead patients, resulting in social stereotypes of nurses (L. Q. Wang et al., 2021 ). It is necessary to make full use of new media to objectively introduce the nursing profession to the public, publicize outstanding nursing figures and typical deeds, make the public realize the important role of nurses in health care, and create an atmosphere of understanding and supporting nurses in the whole society to enhance the image and credibility of nurses and help nurses deal with problems and solve difficulties effectively (Falkenstrom, 2017 ).
The limitation is that the transferability of this study’s results may be limited as a result of including a small number of participants and the participants all worked in the same hospital in Shanghai. More participants in different cities and hospitals could have increased the variety of the descriptions and experiences. The strength is that the use of purposive sampling facilitated inclusion of participants from a range of demographic groups. The use of maximum variation strategy facilitated that the participants covered different gender, education level, professional title, marital status, seniority and department, which helped to increase the representativeness of sample.
This study provides an in-depth exploration of the problem solving dilemmas of clinical nurses in China and provides valuable insights into the continuing education of nurses. These insights shine a light on areas that warrant further investigation and need to be improved in continuing education of nurses. It is of great significance to improve nurses’ problem-solving ability, improve nurses’ professional quality, effectively solve patients’ medical treatment and health problems, and improve patients’ experience of seeking medical treatment.
Through the semi-structured interview, it is found that the problem-solving dilemma of clinical nurses is affected by many factors. Nurses themselves should be confident, self-improvement, constantly learning and enterprising to improve their own ability, and be good at using new media to improve nurses’ image and credibility. Hospitals, nursing administrators and nursing educators should take corresponding measures to improve the knowledge structure of nurses, cultivate nurses’ positive professional values and adaptability, and give full organizational support to nurses. optimize the allocation of nursing human resources to provide a strong guarantee for nurses to deal with problems solving dilemma.
Yu Mei Li : associate chief nurse, master degree, master supervisor, engaged in nursing of tumor patients.
Yifan Luo : nurse, master degree, engaged in clinical nursing.
This work was supported by the Graduate Education Research and Reform Education Management program of Tongji University [2021YXGL09].
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
This paper primarily focuses on solving the Heilbronn problem of convex polygons, which involves minimizing the area of a convex polygon P 1 P 2 … P n while satisfying the condition that the areas of all triangles formed by consecutive vertices are equal to \(1\over 2\) . The problem is reformulated as a polynomial optimization problem with a bilinear objective function and bilinear constraints. A new method is presented to verify the upper and lower bounds for the optimization problem. The upper bound is obtained by the affine regular decagon. Then Bilinear Matrix Inequalities (BMI) theory and the branch-and-bound technique are used to verify the lower bound of the problem. The paper concludes by proving that the lower bound for the area minimization problem of a convex polygon with 10 vertices is 13.076548. The relative error compared to the global optimum is 0.104%.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Subscribe and save.
Price includes VAT (Russian Federation)
Instant access to the full article PDF.
Rent this article via DeepDyve
Institutional subscriptions
Croft H T, Falconer K, and Guy R K, Unsolved Problems in Geometry: Unsolved Problems in Intuitive Mathematics , Springer Science and Business Media, Berlin, 2012.
Google Scholar
Boyce J E, Dobkin D P, Drysdale R L, et al., Finding extremal polygons, SIAM J. Comput. , 1985, 14 (1): 134–147.
Article MathSciNet Google Scholar
Eppstein D, New algorithms for minimum area k -gons, Proceedings of the Third Annual ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms , Ed. by Prederickson G N, Florida, 1992, 83–88.
Eppstein D, Overmars M H, Rote G, et al., Finding minimum area k -gons, Discret. Comput. Geom. , 1992, 7 (1): 45–58.
Mankowski M and Moshkov M, Convex polygon triangulation, Dynamic Programming Multi-Objective Combinatorial Optimization , Eds. by Mankowski M and Moshkov M, Springer, Berlin, 2021, 99–109.
Chapter Google Scholar
Audet C, Hansen P, and Messine F, Extremal problems for convex polygons, J. Glob. Optim. , 2007, 38 (2): 163–179.
Nikonorov Y G and Nikonorova O Y, Some extremal problems for polygons in the euclidean plane, 2022, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00010-023-00991-w , arXiv: 2209.05940.
Brass P, Moser W O J, and Pach J, Research Problems in Discrete Geometry , Springer, Berlin, 2005.
Dehbi L and Zeng Z B, Heilbronn’s problem of eight points in the square, Journal of Systems Science & Complexity , 2022, 35 (6): 2452–2480.
Cohen A, Pohoata C, and Zakharov D, A new upper bound for the Heilbronn triangle problem, 2023, DOI: 10.48550, arXiv: 2305.18253.
Zeng Z B and Chen L, On the Heilbronn optimal configuration of seven points in the square, Automated Deduction in Geometry — 7th International Workshop , Eds. by Sturm T and Zengler C, Shanghai, 2008, 196–224.
Yang L, Zhang J Z, and Zeng Z B, On the conjecture and computing for exact values of the first several Heilbronn numbers, Chin. Ann. Math. (A) , 1992, 13 (4): 503–515.
Hubard A and Suk A, Disjoint faces in drawings of the complete graph and topological heilbronn problems, International Symposium on Computational Geometry , Eds. by Chambers E W and Gudmundsson J, Texas, 2023.
Barequet G, The on-line Heilbronn’s triangle problem, Discret. Comput. Geom. , 2004, 283 (1–3): 7–14.
MathSciNet Google Scholar
Benevides F S, Hoppen C, Lefmann H, et al., Heilbronn triangle-type problems in the unit square [0, 1] 2 , Random Struct. Algorithms , 2023, 62 (3): 585–599.
Dress A W M, Yang L, and Zeng Z B, Heilbronn problem for six points in a planar convex body, Minimax and Applications , Eds. by Du D Z and Pardalos P M, Springer, Berlin, 1995, 173–190.
Zeng Z B, Lu J, Dehbi L, et al., A heilbronn type inequality for plane nonagons, Maple in Mathematics Education and Research — Third Maple Conference , Eds. by Gerhard J and Kotsireas I S, Ontario, 2019.
Zeng Z B and Shan M J, Semi-mechanization method for a unsolved optimization problem in combinatorial geometry, Proceedings of the 2007 ACM Symposium on Applied Computing , Eds. by Cho Y, Wainwright R L, Haddad H, et al., Seoul, 2007, 762–766.
Wang Y and Rajamani R, Feasibility analysis of the bilinear matrix inequalities with an application to multi-objective nonlinear observer design, Conference on Decision and Control , Las Vegas, 2016, 3252–3257.
Bergstra J and Bengio Y, Random search for hyper-parameter optimization, J. Mach. Learn. Res. , 2012, 13 : 281–305.
Kassoul K, Zufferey N, Cheikhrouhou N, et al., Exponential particle swarm optimization for global optimization, IEEE Access , 2022, 10 : 78320–78344.
Article Google Scholar
Nohra C J, Raghunathan A U, and Sahinidis N V, SDP-quality bounds via convex quadratic relaxations for global optimization of mixed-integer quadratic programs, Math. Program. , 2022, 196 (1): 203–233.
Lu C and Deng Z B, A branch-and-bound algorithm for solving max- k -cut problem, J. Glob. Optim. , 2021, 81 (2): 367–389.
Fukuda M and Kojima M, Branch-and-cut algorithms for the bilinear matrix inequality eigenvalue problem, Comput. Optim. Appl. , 2001, 19 (1): 79–105.
Goh K C, Safonov M G, and Papavassilopoulos G P, Global optimization for the biaffine matrix inequality problem, J. Glob. Optim. , 1995, 7 (4): 365–380.
Takano S, Watanabe T, and Yasuda K, Branch and bound technique for global solution of BMI, J-STAGE. , 1997, 33 (7): 701–708.
Download references
Authors and affiliations.
Shanghai Key Laboratory of Trustworthy Computing, East China Normal University, Shanghai, 200241, China
Niuniu Qi, Lydia Dehbi, Banglong Liu & Zhengfeng Yang
Department of Mathematics, Shanghai University, Shanghai, 200444, China
Zhenbing Zeng
You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar
Correspondence to Lydia Dehbi .
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant No. 12171159, and the National Natural Science Fund of China Research Fund for International Scientists under Grant No. 12350410363.
Reprints and permissions
Qi, N., Dehbi, L., Liu, B. et al. Global Optimization for Heilbronn Problem of Convex Polygons Based on Bilinear Matrix Inequalities Solving. J Syst Sci Complex (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11424-024-3366-y
Download citation
Received : 10 September 2023
Revised : 12 November 2023
Published : 07 September 2024
DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11424-024-3366-y
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
IMAGES
VIDEO
COMMENTS
2. Methodology. To create the 4W framework, the integrative literature review was chosen. According to Snyder (2019), this review is 'useful when the purpose of the review is not to cover all articles ever published on the topic but rather to combine perspectives to create new theoretical models' (p.334).The scope of this review focused on research disclosing problem solving process that ...
The effectiveness of collaborative problem solving in ...
Design Thinking: A Creative Approach to Problem Solving
Learning motivation is usually considered to be conducive to problem solving as it influences the initiation, direction, and intensity of cognitive processing (Baars et al., 2017). The motivation to deal with problem-solving tasks can come from the learners themselves or be triggered by task design.
In this way, thinkers have the tools not only to solve problems but also to reveal new problems. ... including textbooks, peer-reviewed journal articles, and scholarly books - tend to make objective, evidence-based arguments to support theoretical positions. We regard these readings as necessary for the growth of critical thinkers. Gradually ...
Theory of Problem Solving
Problem solving articles from across Nature Portfolio. Problem solving is the mental process of analyzing a situation, learning what options are available, and then choosing the alternative that ...
Problem solving is the process of articulating solutions to problems. Problems have two critical attributes. First, a problem is an unknown in some context. That is, there is a situation in which there is something that is unknown (the difference between a goal state and a current state). Those situations vary from algorithmic math problems to ...
Problem-Based Learning: An Overview of its Process and ...
By drawing from the literature on technological pedagogical content knowledge, design thinking, general and specific methods of problem solving, and role of technologies for solving problems, this article highlights the importance of problem solving for future teachers and discusses strategies that can help them become good problem solvers and ...
Critical Thinking: A Model of Intelligence for Solving Real- ...
Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy. Solving or attempting to solve problems is the typical and, hence, general function of thought. A theory of problem solving must first explain how the problem is constituted, and then how the solution happens, but also how it happens that it is not solved; it must explain the ...
Defining collaborative problem solving. Collaborative problem solving refers to "problem-solving activities that involve interactions among a group of individuals" (O'Neil et al., Citation 2003, p. 4; Zhang, Citation 1998, p. 1).In a more detailed definition, "CPS in educational setting is a process in which two or more collaborative parties interact with each other to share and ...
Although researchers have examined problem solving, there is still a lot we don't know about how we strategically work through problems. In a 2013 article published in the Journal of Cognitive Psychology, Ngar Yin Louis Lee (Chinese University of Hong Kong) and APS William James Fellow Philip N. Johnson-Laird (Princeton University) examined ...
Complex problem solving "takes place for reducing the barrier between a given start state and an intended goal state with the help of cognitive activities and behavior. Start state, intended goal state, and barriers prove complexity, change dynamically over time, and can be partially intransparent" (Funke, 2012, p. 682). Teams dealing with ...
There have been a number of previous studies, emphasis has been placed on the importance and meaning of rational problem-solving processes in order to improve problem-solving abilities, and research has focused on individual problem solving styles (Woodman et al., 1993; Scott & Bruce, 1994).According to the personal innovation behavior model of Scott and Bruce (), climate has shown individual ...
For example, studies on topics related to problem solving (Helmi et al., Citation 2016), ... Wang has published more than 20 refereed journal articles and several book chapters in creativity and assessment domains. She has been an anonymous reviewer for many journals, such as Creativity Research Journal, International Journal of Educational ...
The Journal of Problem Solving (JPS) was a multidisciplinary journal that published empirical and theoretical papers on mental mechanisms involved in problem solving. The journal welcomed original and rigorous research in all areas of human problem solving, with special interest in those difficult problems in which human beings outperform artificial systems.
The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of problem solving therapy (PST) on effortful cognition in major depression (MD). Methods: The participants included an antidepressant treatment (AT) group (n = 31) or the combined antidepressant treatment and PST (CATP) group (n = 32) and healthy controls (HCs) (n = 30).
They were selected Journal of Educational Issues ISSN 2377-2263 2022 from a class of 20 students as they failed the placement test regarding plans in daily life -the concept learned in the class ...
Screen Time at Age 1 Year and Communication ...
The art of problem solving and its translation into practice
Some problems exist in classical optimization algorithms to solve multi-modal optimization problems and other complex systems. A Dynamic Niches-based Improved Hybrid Breeding Optimization (DNIHBO) algorithm is proposed to address the multi-modal optimization problem in the paper. By dynamically adjusting the niche scale, it effectively addresses the issue of niche parameter sensitivity.
In particular, the information portrayed in the diagrams have assisted students to formulate equations to solve word problems. In fact, this is the algebra approach which has been shown to be a powerful means for solving word problems (Kieran, Citation 1992). However, the merit of incorporating a diagram for learning to solve word problems goes ...
The influencing factors of clinical nurses' problem solving ...
This paper primarily focuses on solving the Heilbronn problem of convex polygons, which involves minimizing the area of a convex polygon P1P2 … Pn while satisfying the condition that the areas of all triangles formed by consecutive vertices are equal to $$1\\over 2$$ 1 2 . The problem is reformulated as a polynomial optimization problem with a bilinear objective function and bilinear ...