Book excerpt: Nursing success begins with the fundamentals! Nursing Fundamentals Demystified, Second Edition offers a fast and interesting way for you to understand the foundational concepts and information that will be the cornerstone of your entire nursing education and career. It helps you sort through the mountain of information nursing students face and focus on the essentials – that which you truly must know to be a successful nurse. You’ll also learn how apply this information to real-world clinical situations. In order to make the learning process as effective as possible, you’ll find learning aids such as learning objectives, key terms, tables and boxed information which summarize important concepts; nursing alerts which detail critical safety information; spotlights on evidence-based practice; nursing care plans which help you identify key assessment data, nursing diagnoses, and interventions; procedure tips to assist you with the clinical application of content; questions throughout each chapter to help you evaluate your comprehension; and NCLEX®-style questions for exam preparation.