Beyond Environmental Services: Common Cleaning Gaps in Patient Care

During rounds in an outpatient clinic, I noticed staff cleaning vaginal ultrasound probes between patients with a quaternary ammonium disinfectant wipe (a low-level disinfectant appropriate for use on devices that come in contact with intact skin). When I asked about the process, the staff explained that because the probe was covered with a probe cover, they assumed a disinfectant wipe was sufficient. While probe covers provide an important layer of protection, they can leak or develop microscopic perforations. Because contamination can still occur, these probes should always be treated as if they have contacted mucous membranes and require a high-level disinfectant (appropriate for use on devices that come in contact with mucous membranes or non-intact skin) instead of a low-level disinfectant.

Gaps in knowledge and execution.

This type of misunderstanding is not uncommon in health care and illustrates a broader challenge: cleaning failures are often not caused by lack of effort but by gaps in knowledge and execution. Despite longstanding guidance, inconsistencies in cleaning and disinfection practices continue to be cited during regulatory and accrediting surveys.

The Spaulding classification system.

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2026-06-09T13:51:48-04:00June 9th, 2026|infection control, Nursing, patient safety, Public health|0 Comments
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The Missing Decade: Nursing Informatics Can Shape the Future of Menopause Care

A fragmented documentation model and episodic care.

Perimenopause and menopause are not isolated events. They are dynamic physiologic transitions that can unfold over years, sometimes more than a decade, affecting sleep, cognition, mood, cardiovascular health, metabolic health, musculoskeletal function, sexual health, and overall quality of life. Midlife is not simply “the years before aging.” It is a critical window into healthy aging.

Yet most health care systems continue to function through episodic encounters and what has become the fragmented documentation model. A woman may discuss insomnia with one provider, anxiety with another, joint pain with an orthopedist, and irregular cycles with a gynecologist. Rarely are these experiences connected longitudinally across systems, specialties, or time.

The infrastructure reflects that fragmentation.

Many electronic health records (EHRs) still lack standardized structured fields for menopause stage, symptom burden, menstrual pattern changes, longitudinal symptom tracking, or patient-generated health data integration. Symptoms are often buried in free-text notes, inconsistently coded, or disconnected from meaningful clinical context. Even when women are telling us exactly what they are experiencing, our systems frequently lack the structure to interpret these lived experiences as computable longitudinal health data.

From a nursing informatics perspective, the signal is there. The systems simply are not built to see it.

The wider context.

By 2030, more than 1.2 billion women worldwide will […]

2026-06-03T10:27:58-04:00June 3rd, 2026|digital health, documentation, Nursing, nursing informatics, Patients, women's health|0 Comments
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Early Male Caregivers and the Long History of Men in Nursing

A profession that keeps “rediscovering” men

Men remain a minority in nursing. In the United States, men made up only 2.7% of registered nurses in 1970 and 9.6% in 2011, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. More recent workforce data suggest that men now account for about 10% to 12% of registered nurses. As noted in an American Association of Colleges of Nursing fact sheet, data from the National Nursing Workforce Survey showed that the proportion of male RNs reached 11.2% in 2022 before adjusting slightly downward to 10.4% in 2024. These numbers explain why male nurses may still be read as exceptions. A patient sees a man in scrubs and assumes he is the physician. A male nursing student notices he is one of only a few men in the classroom. A hospital celebrates men entering nursing as a “new trend.”

Yet the increase of men in modern nursing should not be taken to imply they are newcomers to the profession. Men have been present in nursing’s story since its inception, even when later histories forgot to name them or, arguably, chose to ignore them.

The problem is partly historical language. The modern word “nurse” suggests licensure, registration, scope of practice, and a […]

2026-05-26T10:15:28-04:00May 26th, 2026|Nursing|1 Comment
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Virtual Nursing, AFib Update, and More June Issue Highlights

The June issue of AJN is now live.

Here are some highlights. Some articles are open access or temporarily free; others will require log-in for access.

How do hospitalized patients feel about the use of virtual nurses for tasks like admissions, discharges, patient education, and answering questions? In their Original Research article in this issue, “Patients’ Experiences of a Virtual Nursing Model in an Acute Care Setting: A Mixed-Methods Study,” Tajudaullah Bhaloo and colleagues explore patients’ perspectives on a co-caring virtual nursing model as part of their care in a medical–surgical acute care unit.

This month’s CE article, “Updates on the Management of Atrial Fibrillation,” (free to access) reviews the latest guidelines from the American College of Cardiology, American Heart Association, American College of Clinical Pharmacy, and Heart Rhythm Society, highlighting three core components: anticoagulation in nonvalvular AF, rate control, and rhythm control.

The newest installment of our Evidence-Based Decision-Making (EBDM) series, “Evaluation for Clinical Practice Change,” explores evaluation within EBDM and clinical practice–focused projects (EBP, QI, and EBQI), presenting practical QI tools to support clinical practice change. A commentary, “Positioning DNPs to Lead,” accompanies the article.

An open-access Quality Improvement article, “Reducing Blood Culture Contamination Rates in the ED,” discusses […]

2026-05-21T09:53:36-04:00May 21st, 2026|Nursing|0 Comments
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Helping Patients Live Inside Changing Realities

Why earlier palliative care conversations matter in oncology nursing

Image of oncology nurse and a patient discussing palliative care options in a warm and supportive settingOne patient I still think about came in frequently for supportive care visits. Technically, the appointments were straightforward. She was there for things like IV fluids or symptom management. But her visits were rarely simple. She had questions about labs, treatment side effects, fatigue, and what different changes in her body meant. Over time, our conversations expanded beyond the immediate medical task in front of us.

She talked about how much harder everyday life had become. She tired easily. Walking longer distances became difficult. She was losing independence in ways that frightened her. Eventually, we began talking about mobility aids. She did not want a walker or wheelchair. To her, they represented loss.

I remember trying to reframe the conversation. I told her that using a walker did not mean she had stopped living fully. If being outdoors mattered to her, then the goal was not preserving the image of how she used to move through the world. The goal was helping her continue participating in the parts of life she still loved. A wheelchair might allow her to […]

2026-05-19T12:02:50-04:00May 19th, 2026|Nursing, Oncology nursing, Palliative care|0 Comments
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Views expressed on the blog are solely those of the authors or persons quoted. They do not necessarily reflect AJN’s views or those of Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.
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