What kinds of poll questions would you like us to ask? Our first one (still active) was about nursing and the economy. Too boring? Too depressing? Too obvious? What kinds of questions matter to you? We’d like to know.
Archive for March, 2009
Postcard from Cardiff, Pt. 2: Diana Mason Wins the Impact Factor Debate
March 30, 2009We won! To follow up on my last post: At a debate today at the Royal College of Nursing’s so-called “fringe session” at its annual International Nursing Research Conference, Elizabeth Anionwu, emeritus professor of nursing at Thames Valley University in Middlesex (near London), joined me in arguing in opposition to the statement, “research should be published in the highest impact journals available.” Read the rest of this entry ?
Are Nurses to Blame for Failures in Infection Control?
March 27, 2009
Photo by ad-vantage / Vanessa Agressti, from Flickr.
In early 2008 the largest hepatitis C outbreak in U.S. history resulted from nurse anesthetists reusing syringes and medication vials at an outpatient endoscopy clinic, as Carol Potera reports in the April issue of AJN. Five of the nurses relinquished their licenses a year ago when the investigation began, as did two physicians, and the clinic was fined $500,000. Now, Nevada lawmakers are considering new legislation that might prevent another such crisis.
An excellent graphic in the Las Vegas Review-Journal illustrates just how the reuse of medication vials, even with the use of sterile syringes, could contribute to such an outbreak. But a year after the hepatitis C outbreak, a nagging question remains: how and why did five nurse anesthetists violate the basics of infection-control protocols? When they reused syringes and medication vials, were they following orders out of fear of losing their jobs? Or were they unfairly scapegoated in a system without sufficient safeguards?
Read the rest of this entry ?
Postcard from Cardiff: Diana Mason Takes the Pulse of Nursing in the UK
March 26, 2009
Cardiff Castle, Wales. Courtesy of the Library of Congress, LC-DIG-ppmsc-07388
I’m in the UK, preparing to present at a debate tomorrow sponsored by the Royal College of Nursing for its annual International Nursing Research Conference in Cardiff, Wales. The debate will focus on the statement, ”This house believes that research should be published in the highest impact journals available.” (Here’s Wikipedia on the meaning of “impact factor,” if you want a rough idea of what’s involved.) I’m joining Elizabeth Anionwu, Emeritus Professor of Nursing at Thames Valley University, in arguing the opposing position. We intend to win this debate! Attendees do vote. I’ll report the outcome tomorrow.
But this morning, I was stunned by a story in London’s Daily Telegraph reporting that Read the rest of this entry ?
Risk of Mortality: 100 percent!
March 25, 2009
Doug Brandt, AJN associate editor
I’m ranting. That’s what a word curmudgeon does. I am curmudgeon, hear me rant:
I’m begging anyone who edits or writes for a scientific publication not to use the word “mortality” when a simple death would do the job. Read the rest of this entry ?
Publication in AJN Seen as Holy Grail by YouTube Songster
March 25, 2009Here’s a YouTube video that’s come to our attention. It’s nice to know our cover could inspire a song. This might be a first!
Next week from London…
March 24, 2009AJN editor-in-chief Diana Mason is on vacation at an undisclosed location by the sea this week. Next week she’ll be blogging from a conference in London, where she’s scheduled to speak. (In the meantime, Off the Charts will have plenty of other posts. By the way, a fairly small percentage of our blog readers have taken the poll on nursing and the economy we posted last week. It takes about a second! Or tell us what you’d like a poll to ask, if this one doesn’t speak to your experience.)
Diana Mason, AJN editor-in-chief
RealityRN.com: just right for students and new nurses
March 24, 2009I wish there was something like RealityRN.com available back when I was a new nurse. In addition to reading the site’s great articles on career management, participants can post their own stories or questions about nursing and get feedback from one another in a safe, friendly environment. There are also useful videos and humorous postings. (The very good video series on how to deal with preceptors would have helped me back in 1996. I just recommended them to a friend of mine who was fired from her first nursing position due to a conflict with a preceptor.) While the site is geared toward new nurses and students, experienced nurses will find it interesting too and can use it as a venue to mentor novices who are struggling with their new roles.
Christine Moffa, MS, RN, is AJN’s clinical editor. She will be giving periodic updates and recommendations, so check back.
"Nurse Moffa," AJN's clinical editor, with pals Rico and Giusepina
“Nurses don’t teach. They educate!” OK, but…. (A style update from the Word Curmudgeon)
March 23, 2009I had a few comments but no death threats after my first post, about “nurse writers.” That fact gives me the courage to tackle another grammatical pet peeve of mine. Let me admit, up front, that probably no one else in the world cares about this, and no one else appears to have written about it. This could mean either that I’m really astute or completely wrong.
Education is central to what nurses do. Nurses educate. They work hard, as we do here at AJN, to elevate the image of nursing and nurses in the public eye (as well as the eyes of the medical community, policymakers, and politicians).
It’s understandable, then, that when nurses want to talk or write about something as central to nursing as patient education, they would choose the verb “educate” rather than “teach.”
The Invisible Experts: What Nurses Know About Aging and Chronic Illnesses Like Diabetes
March 20, 2009Is it any coincidence that AJN recently heard from editorial board member Michael Desjardins and contributing editor Jane Seley about ways physicians and the mainstream media remain blind to the cutting-edge work being done by nurses in developing new models of care for the elderly and the chronically ill, including those with diabetes? This is a narrative that has to change if our health care system is going to face the challenges coming its way. Read the rest of this entry ?
