White Uniforms for Nurses? The ‘Nays’ Have It…

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

Nurses and patients aboard U.S.S. Relief, 1921/via Wikipedia

Well, if sheer numbers rule, then the image of nurses in white uniforms has gone the way of the nurse’s cap.

Earlier this week, on AJN’s Facebook page, I asked whether RNs should go back to white uniforms as a professional standard. Within a few hours there were 20 comments; by the next day there were about 200 comments (we had to delete the post with the first 100 or so, since we were unsure about the copyright status of the image used—very sorry if that included your comment!).

Clearly, nurses care about what they wear. Comments ranged from one word (“No,” with multiple exclamation points), to thoughtful reasoning around stains and keeping the uniforms clean, to advocating for an individual’s right to choice (about colors, that is).

There were only a few comments that were pro-white, with arguments that they were more professional than colors and “wild prints” and helped patients identify RNs from other staff more easily.

Here’s a sampling of comments (a few minor typos corrected):

Yes—but no hats.

No—but I do think it makes a lot of sense to be able to clearly identify who is an RN when you are a patient in a hospital. Clear identification is definitely a problem.

I support white uniforms. This is the required color at the Cleveland Clinic. Patients tend to appreciate the crisp, clean look of […]

2016-11-21T13:09:03-05:00October 26th, 2012|healthcare social media, nursing perspective|4 Comments
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Where Do You Get Your News?

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

I’ve watched the recent political conventions and have been listening to the sound bites one hears on the radio and television news shows. The speakers and newscasters all sound intelligent and righteous and in command of “facts.” However, as we’ve learned from the widespread public misunderstanding of many aspects of the Affordable Care Act, it takes some deeper digging to know what’s “spin” versus what’s fact. (Indeed, fact-checking has become its own political issue, as it seems both parties have been playing a bit loose when it suits their messaging.)

I wonder how many people actually take the time to validate what they hear on the radio or television. Do most people take what they hear at face value? Will many people vote based only on what they heard from the convention coverage or in 30-second news clips (or worse, in the barrage of advertising paid for by the PACs, many of which are quietly funded by industries or wealthy individuals with a stake in who gets elected)?

It occurred to me that I’ve never seen my youngest son or nieces and nephews read a newspaper, yet they seem well-informed about the political issues. I asked my son where he gets his information. He said, “Well, there’s something called RSS feeds . . . .” (He was surprised that I not only knew what they were, but that I use them!) (RSS stands for really […]

2016-11-21T13:09:22-05:00September 10th, 2012|healthcare social media|3 Comments
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Health information Technology, EHRs, Meaningful Use, and Nursing

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

If you’re like most nurses working in a health care organization, you’ve been involved in a migration to electronic health records, computerized physician order entry (CPOE), or bar code medication administration.

If you’re lucky, nursing input was considered during the planning stages of all this health information technology (HIT). We’ve heard from many nurses (and have had a few submissions from nurses about their experiences—see for example the Reflections essay “Paper Chart Nurse”) who have had “issues” with the systems or who wonder, why the big push?

In the August issue of AJN, which is available online and on the iPad (download the app here), Susan McBride and colleagues John Delaney and Mari Tietze debut their three-part series on HIT. The first article, “Health Information Technology and Nursing,” examines the federal policies behind efforts to expand the use of this technology, the importance of meaningful use, and the implications for nurses. Subsequent articles upcoming in the fall will take a closer look at the use of HIT to improve patient safety and quality of care, and the important role nurses are playing—and could play—in this system-wide initiative.

It’s crucial for nurses to understand HIT. As the authors note,

“If HIT systems are going to truly improve care, nurses need a voice in their planning and development to ensure patient safety and system usability. The success of this technology depends on nurses informing the […]

2016-11-21T13:09:28-05:00August 15th, 2012|digital health, nursing perspective|3 Comments
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Tortoise and Hare: Top 15 AJN Blog Posts for Past Quarter

By Jacob Molyneux, AJN senior editor/blog editor

Dance Floor, via Flickr

We haven’t done as many posts as usual for the past few months. Various contributors are on the lam, vacationing, singing arias, earning PhDs, watching “Game of Thrones” episodes over and over and the like. So be it. 

But here is a list of the most popular posts over the past three months, in case you missed any of these at the time. Of necessity, since this is a blog, some are more ephemeral in their subject matter and relevance than others.

One or two, like “Do Male Nurses Face Reverse Sexism?”, are several years old but still hit the mark. Some were quick studies, grabbed all their readers in a matter of a few days and then tapered off quickly, while others came on slowly like the tortoise, steadily accumulating readers, asserting their charm via random Google searches.

Feel free to let us know what topics you’d like to see covered in the future. We can’t promise we can deliver, but it’s good to get a variety of perspectives. A greater clinical focus? More on policy? More on the nuts and bolts of nursing subspecialties? More personal narratives from nurses or patients? More posts related to recent published research? More polls? Trivial gossip about celebrities? To repeat: Let us know! And enjoy the early summer weekend.

“The Case of Amanda Trujillo”

“New Nurses Face Reality Shock in Hospital Settings – So What Else is New?”

“‘How Can You Bear to […]

2016-11-21T13:09:49-05:00June 22nd, 2012|healthcare social media|0 Comments
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Essential Nursing Resources: A Crucial Tool for Nurses Seeking Information on the Web

This nursing resource will help you find anything you need to know

By Maureen Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

Back in the dark ages, before the Web, when I was in school and researching a topic, I would go to the university library (in Manhattan, this meant a subway ride to the main campus), fill out a form, and hand it to the librarian. After a couple of hours, I’d check back and the librarian would have pulled up to eight “on-reserve” books (no more were allowed until these were returned) from the stacks and have them waiting for me. This cycle would repeat itself several times, and sometimes I’d have to wait for an “ILL”—an interlibrary loan. Of course, if I procrastinated, the material I wanted might already have been taken out by other students and I’d be out of luck, facing a deadline with no source material.

Of course, it’s all different now with the Web. This week, even the venerable Encyclopedia Britannica announced it is ceasing print production after almost 250 years and will only be available in digital format.

Now, researchers and students have virtually every article published available to them via the Internet. For nurses, there’s something called Essential Nursing Resources (pdf), an annotated listing of resources for nursing published by the Interagency Council on Information Resources in Nursing (ICIRN). 

Founded in 1960 (here’s a brief history) by […]

2016-11-21T13:10:20-05:00April 10th, 2012|digital health, nursing research|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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