How should the nurse ascertain the best position to facilitate clearing the lungs while she prepares to perform postural drainage?

The correct answer to this question is that the nurse should perform auscultation on the patient. Auscultation is a procedure which involves listening to the sounds of the body. The sounds listened to are internal. A stethoscope is used to listen to these sounds. The purpose of listening to these sounds is to be able to diagnose a disease.

Auscultation can also be used to examine respiratory and gastrointestinal systems. It is essential for the physician performing the procedure to have excellent listening skills and to be skillful in locating the sounds they need to listen to. French physician Rene Laennec developed this concept with his invention of the stethoscope.

Auscultation-rationale: the nurse should assess breath sounds before doing postural drainage to determine the areas that need draining. inspection, chest x-rays, and abg levels are all assessment parameters that give good information about respiratory function but arent necessary to determine lung areas requiring postural drainage.client needs category: physiological integrityclient needs subcategory: physiological adaptationcognitive level: analysisreference: smeltzer, s.c., et al. brunner & suddarths textbook of medical-surgical nursing, 11th ed. philadelphia: lippincott williams & wilkins, 2008, p. 731.