The Roy adaptation model focuses on four main metaparadigms including the person, environment, health and nursing. As far as Roy is concerned, the person is not viewed as a single entity, for instance, a patient with a physical illness who should be medically treated and released. Instead, the person is understood to be a biopsychosocial being. This being does not exist in a vacuum, but rather interacts on a variety of levels in an environment that is always changing. “The environment includes focal, contextual and residual stimuli. A focal stimulus is the confrontation with one’s internal and external environment. The individual immediately resists these internal and external stimuli” (Ursavaş, Karayurt, & İşeri, 2014, p.136).
The Adaptation model is the brainchild of Sister Callista Roy. In the mid 1970’s, Roy, a professor at Mount Saint Mary’s College, felt that nursing needed to be more than a person who monitored vital signs and handed out medication for patients recovering from illness in the hospital. She believed that this career was more of a “service to society” (Roy Adaptation Model, 2016, p.1). In order to become this service to society, Roy needed to know three things:
Who is the focus of nursing care?
What is the target of nursing care?
When is nursing care indicated? (Roy Adaptation Model, 2016, p.1).
For Roy, patients needed more than treatment provided by medical professionals, they also needed to buy into the fact that they are a part of an environment