Posts Tagged ‘AJN’

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Critical Care 2012: An Educational Extravaganza

May 29, 2012

By Maureen Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

So, for the 12th or 13th time (I’ve lost count), I attended the National Teaching Institute of the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (the “other” AACN organization, not to be confused with the American Association of Colleges of Nursing) in Orlando last week. And as usual it was impressive—approximately 6,000 attendees, and rows and rows of exhibitors. There were two helicopters, a bus, and an ambulance in the exhibit hall, as well as two-story booths and classrooms. While there were some recruiters looking for staff, they were overshadowed by monitoring companies, bed and equipment manufacturers, and pharmaceutical companies.

Some highlights:

Left to right: Outgoing AACN president Mary Stahl and incoming president for 2013, Kathryn Roberts.

Kudos to the AACN for its creativity in making general sessions lively and interesting. This year, the organization held open auditions for a member to assist as “MC” for the general sessions (or “super sessions”). It was a tie, and attendees were treated to two of their own in action, hamming it up and enjoying the spotlight.

The “TED-talk” presentation style used by both AACN president  Mary Stahl and president-elect Kathryn Roberts was refreshing—and unique for nursing meetings.

I interviewed both presidents—click the link to listen to the podcast (it may take a minute to load). The 2013 president, Kathryn Roberts, MSN, RN, CNS, CCRN, CCNS, is a clinical nurse specialist in the pediatric ICU at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia; she chose “dare to” as her theme for the year.

My favorite session, hands down, was Elizabeth Bridges’ “Critical Care Studies You Should Know About,” in which she pulled apart recent research and evaluated it in the context of other studies. She is the only person I know who can have 500+ people laughing and learning statistical analysis. (After hearing her speak last year, I approached her to do a column for AJN. Her column, Critical Analysis: Critical Care, debuted earlier this year with “Central Venous Pressure Monitoring: What’s the Evidence?”—free until June 12. And she’s working on two more.)

The engaging super session featuring Robyn Benincasa—a firefighter, world class adventure racer (think Survivor and The Amazing Race combined), and motivational speaker—illustrated what one could achieve with team support, leadership, and perseverance. (Of course, being in superb shape for firefighting, endurance biking, and mountain climbing doesn’t hurt either.)

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Posted in nursing perspective, nursing research, Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief | Tagged , , | Leave a Comment »

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At the Terminus of Romantic Dreams, an ICU

April 26, 2012

It was early. The sun had yet to rise, but already the ICU was filled with stark fluorescence and beeping alarms. My patient sat alone and aphasic, helpless amidst the bustle of the unit. The day stretched long ahead of us.

The circumstances of Frank’s admission were unusual. The nursing report (conveyed with a snicker) was that, while vacationing in our coastal city with his mistress, he’d slipped away and visited yet another lady friend. While engaged in an “intimate” act, he’d hit his head on the coffee table and been knocked unconscious.

The paramedic’s report backed up that version of events, but Frank’s admission CT scans of the brain weren’t consistent with head trauma. Instead, a vascular abnormality was found. He’d suffered two seizures since admission to the hospital.

by utahwildflowers/via Flickr

That’s the start of “The Love Song of Frank,” the Reflections essay in the May issue of AJN. Click on its title to read the entire essay (and, once there, perhaps click through to the PDF version for the best read). 

Those of you who know the T. S. Eliot poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” (beautifully spun, and a favorite of bookish adolescents for its highly quotable and world-weary take on conventional society) will recognize the irony in the title.

But the essay, by ICU nurse and regular AJN blogger Marcy Phipps, stands on its own in its sympathetic but unsentimental description of a nurse’s encounter with a man who’s reached the limits of his own brand of romanticism. Some readers may have less compassion for this man and his apparent fate than others. Either way, it’s well worth a read, and not our typical Reflections essay either, if such a thing exists.—JM, senior editor/blog editor 

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Posted in nursing perspective, writing and nursing | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

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Future Nurses Have Their Say

April 17, 2012

By Maureen Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

I spent part of last week in Pittsburgh, attending the National Student Nurses Association (NSNA) annual meeting. This one was special—the 60th anniversary of the organization.

NSNA Imprint Feb/Mar issue cover

Despite the celebratory air (not only because of the anniversary, but because the organization had exceeded its membership goal of 60,000 members), the 2,700 attendees seemed very serious about the work of the organization and about learning skills to help them in their careers—there were few slackers in this crowd.

The approximately 500 students who represented their states in the house of delegates dealt with some 40 resolutions, on such diverse topics as increasing awareness of the effects of third-hand smoke on children to supporting the “BSN-in-10” movement (a push for legislation requiring all new nurses to get bachelor’s degrees within 10 years).

For me, the best part is meeting future nurses and speaking with them about career plans. I met many students in the exhibit hall, where I was demonstrating AJN’s new iPad app. Unlike last year, when jobs seemed to be scarce, many of the seniors I spoke with this time around had already secured jobs—and those who hadn’t seemed confident they would.

Finish this sentence . . . I asked several of those about to start their nursing careers to finish the following sentence: “I’m excited about starting my nursing career because . . .” You can listen to their comments in this short podcast.

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Posted in audio interviews, nursing students, professional identity, Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

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Early Spring Web Roundup: Insomnia, Early Delivery, Persistence, Painkillers, Overtesting

April 6, 2012

Cherry Blossoms, Washington, DC/by cliff1066, via Flickr

We’ve been a little quiet here on the blog this week. Maybe it has to do with the opening of baseball season or signals a hangover from media coverage of the Supreme Court give-and-take about the Affordable Care Act last week and the endless guesses about how the court is likely to vote come June. Or maybe all our nurse bloggers are using spare time to clean out closets, sweep the cherry blossoms and sale inserts from the sidewalk, purge the inbox, box up the humidifier, watch Mad Men, or whatever. But here are a few things we’d like to draw your attention to:

If the windy spring nights wake you (or your patients) to the sound of a trash can lid flying away, maybe this will help: As described in the Drug Watch column in AJN‘s April issue, a sublingual form of the drug zolpidem (think Ambien) has now been approved, with the fancy name Intermezzo, for people who wake in the middle of the night and start hearing the same song over and over in their heads or thinking of the perfect comeback to that snippy waiter.

Also in the April issue, an AJN Reports looks at efforts to get people not to opt for potentially risky early delivery of their babies, and a Reflections essay called “Giving Up—Or Not” details one nurse’s patience and persistence in trying to get a patient to start wanting to live again after major surgery. Here’s an excerpt:

We encourage, beg, cajole, and nag him—to feed himself, to sit in the chair, to roll over. Healing is work, we tell him.

But his body has turned on itself as a substitute for food. His long series of complications has left him discouraged and depressed. If staying comfortable impedes his progress, he’s willing to live with the trade-off.

Sam opens his eyes when I walk into his room, then closes them again. While I assess him, I tell him the plans for the day.

He puts a finger over his trach. “Do I have to have a bath? I feel so tired.” His voice is soft and slightly rasping.

You might have noticed recent headlines about prescription painkiller abuse in the U.S. Read the rest of this entry ?

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Buyer Beware: Most Online Nursing Schools are Reputable, But How Do You Know?

January 3, 2011

By Maureen ‘Shawn’ Kennedy, AJN interim editor-in-chief

Imagine spending a significant amount of money and long hours of study to earn credits toward a nursing degree—and then finding out that the credits are not transferable to the school where you planned to complete the degree. For some nursing students, this is a reality, not just an exercise in imagination.

In the January issue of AJN, we assigned one of our freelance journalists to do a report examining for-profit nursing programs, many of which are online.

Newspaper articles and other news sources and organizations have reported that some students are getting shortchanged, with nursing students sometimes finding themselves ineligible to take licensing exams and facing crippling debt.

I’ve seen ads for various online nursing programs—indeed, AJN and other reputable nursing journals run these promotions in our pages or on our Web sites. Most are credible organizations and many students have indeed graduated from them or with credit obtained through them and gone on to pursue successful careers. But a few such programs apparently fail to deliver on promises—or may not provide full disclosure about what students can expect.

If you’re contemplating going back to school and are considering an online program, be sure to read our report and follow the recommendations from the National Council of State Boards of Nursing detailed in the article. Going back to school might very well be the best decision you make—but make it carefully, and with full knowledge.

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Posted in continuing education, nursing students, Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments »

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Entering the Mainstream? Nursing Research at 25 Years

October 4, 2010
Logo of the United States National Institute o...

Image via Wikipedia

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN interim editor-in-chief

Last Thursday the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) held its kick-off event to celebrate its 25th anniversary—and what could be more appropriate than holding a research symposium at the National Institutes of Health (NIH)? Scientists and researchers (nurses as well as others) whose work is supported by the NINR presented highlights of their research. (See here for synopses.)

Why it matters to all nurses. All nurses, researchers or not, should celebrate the growth and accomplishments of the NINR—its establishment provided tangible recognition of the value of the substantial body of research conducted by and/or about the nursing profession. As practitioners, where would we be without research to provide the evidence underlying care interventions or the processes of delivering that care? With the October issue, AJN highlights the NINR’s silver anniversary: on the cover, with a guest editorial by NINR director Patricia Grady, and with a timeline highlighting key milestones and landmark research supported by the NINR (click through to the PDF version to read this article). To give you an idea why nursing research matters, here’s just one entry on the timeline, from 1998:

Nancy Bergstrom, PhD, RN, FAAN, in a multisite study, tests the Braden Scale for Predicting Pressure Sore Risk and finds its predictive capability accurate. The scale is now widely used in nursing homes and hospitals.

AJN’s role in dissemination. What’s critical, though is that the outcomes of research get disseminated to those at the point of care. Researchers tend to publish in research journals, but how many nurses in clinical practice read those journals? As a general nursing journal with a wide readership, AJN covers the “broad view” of what’s important for most nurses regardless of practice setting or role. It’s our mission “to promote excellence in nursing and health care through the dissemination of evidence-based, peer-reviewed clinical information and original research . . . .”

So on this 25th anniversary of the NINR, my hope for the next decade (we can’t wait another 25 years) is that nursing research will move more and more into mainstream clinical journals.

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Posted in nursing innovations, nursing perspective, nursing research, professional identity, public health nursing, Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment »

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AJN’s Top 10 Articles in 2009

January 13, 2010

So, what were the most highly viewed articles of 2009 on AJNonline?

Here’s our Top Ten list – check them out:

1. Sex and Violence in the Media Influence Teen Behavior – duh!

2. Recognizing Sepsis in the Adult Patient - every nurse should know what to look for

3. Bullying Among Nurses – sad reminder that we might be our own worst enemy

4. Leech Therapy – it may be disconcerting, but it works wonders

5. The Marketing of Osteoporosis – how they turned a risk factor into a disease

6. The Nursing Shortage - this problem’s not going away soon

7. Understanding and Managing Burn Pain: Part 1 - it’s still misunderstood . . . and undertreated

8. Infection Control: Whose Job Is It? - unsafe nursing practices, you say?

9. Staging Pressure Ulcers: What’s the Buzz in Wound Care? – definitions matter!

10. Do Rapid Response Teams Save Lives? – well, it sounded like a neat idea . . .

–Shawn Kennedy, AJN interim editor-in-chief
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Posted in nursing perspective, nursing research, nursing shortage, palliative care, writing and nursing | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

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Nurses Write, Right?

November 2, 2009

By Shawn Kennedy, MA, RN, AJN interim editor-in-chief

WRITE

by karindalziel/ via Flickr Creative Commons

As nurses, we have great stories and insight. We see a side of life few other people see. We see people when they’re sick and tired and defeated by illness. We witness the intimacy of people when they’re most vulnerable, when all pretense has been stripped away. We also have a wealth of scientific knowledge about the effects of illness, how to prevent it and manage it, and what it takes to restore individuals to health or at least to the optimum health possible for them.

As an editor, I’m constantly seeking manuscripts. And I mean constantly—I sometimes feel like a beggar, asking people to “please write that as a case study,” or “please submit that (poignant, funny, revealing, uplifting) story,” or “consider doing an update on (name the problem) incorporating new evidence.” Maybe one out of four pieces materializes.

Nurses writing about nursing is vital to the profession. And it’s not just about writing about research. Research advances knowledge but we also need to know how practitioners are applying knowledge. We know “one size does not fit all”—how does practice need to change to meet the needs of diverse groups? What are the problems and issues aound practice? Is the nursing taught in the classroom connected to the nursing we actually do?

We need to document what we do, why we do it, and what are the outcomes. We need to do this not only to share information that can be helpful to colleagues, but also to share it with the wider health care community and the public. How else can other professions and the public know what we do and why it’s important?  

So think about what you have to say about what you do, what you’ve experienced, and what you know that would benefit your colleagues. And then write about it. We consider many types of articles, from research to opinion pieces to case studies to accounts of personal experiences. AJN’s author guidelines are at www.editorialmanager.com/ajn.

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Posted in nursing perspective, nursing research, Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief, writing and nursing | Tagged , , , , , | 5 Comments »

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AJN Health Care Reform Poll

October 30, 2009

Posted in health care reform | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment »

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A Girl, a Suitcase–a Nurse Who Can’t Forget

September 8, 2009

SeptReflectionsScreen2If I had known how much anguish it would lead to, I might have been tempted not to answer my pager when it went off on that quiet Sunday morning in May. Instead, I innocently dialed the number.

“Cafeteria,” said the voice that answered.

“Hi, this is the nursing manager. Did you page me?”

“We need you right away. A child’s alone down here.”

In the cafeteria I approached the bevy of workers huddled by the phone. “The little girl’s over there,” one of them said, pointing.

A small child was sitting quietly at a table halfway down the room. She had a round face and light brown hair pulled back with a pink barrette, soft curls falling below her ears.

Read the full Reflections essay from the August issue here. As author Joan Greland-Goldstein concludes, “Gina must be in her 20s today, but I still see her as the little girl sitting quietly at the cafeteria table waiting for someone to come back to her.” May ”Gina” someday find that someone.

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Posted in children's health, healing/holistic, nursing perspective, writing and nursing | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

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