AJN’s January Issue: Men in Nursing, Perioperative Medication Withholding in Patients with PD, Book of the Year Awards, More

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AJN’s January issue is now available on our Web site. Here’s a selection of what not to miss, including two continuing education (CE) articles, which you can access for free.

Even though more men are starting to become nurses, they still make up less than 7% of all RNs.  In “Men in Nursing,” the authors discuss the challenges of recruiting and retaining men in the nursing profession. This article is open access and can earn you 2.1 CE credits.

 In this month’s original research article, the authors report on findings from a quantitative study exploring antiparkinson medication withholding times during hospitalization and symptom management. Part one of a two-part series, this article is open access and can earn you 2.5 CE credits. Look for part two in our next issue, which reports on findings from a qualitative study on the perioperative hospitaliza­tion experiences of patients with PD.

After sustaining a needlestick injury during a research study, nurse Lynn Petrik created a new safety device for a commonly used glucose sensor. “From Putty to Prototype” takes readers through the steps of her invention, from the prototype to the provisional patent.

 Looking for a good read? The votes are in, and the winners of AJN’s annual Book of the Year Awards are listed in this issue. A supplemental online only companion to the article gives the judges reviews for each book.  

 And finally, read “The Clinical Nurse […]

2016-11-21T13:08:39-05:00December 28th, 2012|nursing research|0 Comments
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Nurse Staffing Matters at the Shift Level—Evidence-Based Scenarios Illustrate How to Apply What We Know

We know that staffing matters. Studies have shown that hospitals with lower proportions of RNs have higher rates of death overall, death following compli­cations (that is, failure to rescue), and other adverse events. But how do such data on staffing translate into what the average hospital nurse experiences on a shift?

That’s the question posed by Gordon West and colleagues, the authors of this month’s CE, “Staffing Matters—Every Shift.” To address it, they reviewed findings from the Military Nursing Outcomes Database (MilNOD). MilNOD, a quality improve­ment and research project conducted in four phases between 1996 and 2009, encompassed data from 111,500 shifts on 56 inpatient units in 13 U.S. military hospitals. The project explored “the effects of staffing levels and skill mix on the probability of patient falls, medication errors, and needlestick injuries to nursing staff.”

As the authors explain, the MilNOD data showed that the number, mix, and experience of nurses on a shift—not just on a unit—were associated with adverse events for patients and needlestick injuries to nurses. West and colleagues offer several realistic, descriptive scenarios to illustrate the potential effects of staffing changes and to show how such knowledge can be applied to daily decision making.

To learn more, read the article, which is free online.—Sylvia Foley, AJN senior editor


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2016-11-21T13:08:46-05:00December 10th, 2012|nursing research|3 Comments
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BRCA Gene Mutations: Knowing You’re At High Risk for Cancer

‘Autumn Washed Away,’ Diane Hammond/ via Flickr

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

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. We thought we’d do our part with a feature article to help increase nurses’ awareness of some of the issues faced by women who find they are at high risk for breast cancer.

In the October issue, author Rebekah Hamilton describes her research with young women who learn they have a BRCA gene mutation that puts them at greater risk for cancer, especially breast and ovarian cancers. “Breast cancer risk ranges from 50% to 85% by age 50 in women with the mutation and is 12% in women without it.” Her study explores the consequences this knowledge has on decisions these women make about their future, especially those related to prophylactic surgery, relationships, and childbearing, and offers some recommendations for practice. The abstract is below, but I urge you to read the study, especially if your patients include young women.

Objective: Women who carry a BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutation face a risk of developing breast or ovarian cancer at an earlier age than women without such a mutation. Relatively little is known about the psychosocial consequences—especially regarding marriage and childbearing—in young women who test positive for one of these mutations.

Methods: In 2006, participants were recruited from Web sites for women with breast cancer or BRCA gene mutations. Forty-four women ages 18 to 39 from 22 states and Canada […]

2016-11-21T13:09:06-05:00October 15th, 2012|nursing perspective, nursing research|0 Comments
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Nursing Research: Alive and Well

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

Last week I spent two-and-a-half days in Washington, DC, where there are LOTS of campaign collectibles. My favorite: coffee mugs proclaiming “Friends Don’t Let Friends Vote (insert Democratic or Republican).” Also noteworthy: “Hot for Mitt” and “Hot for Barack” hot sauce (see photos). I was there attending the meeting of the Council for the Advancement of Nursing Science (CANS), where close to 1,000 nursing researchers met to share their work. It wasn’t too long ago that one would have been hard-pressed to find that many nurses doing research. The National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) only celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2010 (see our 2010 article about their many accomplishments).

Creativity and innovation. Kathi Mooney, PhD, RN, FAAN, from the University of Utah College of Nursing, gave the keynote—and it was perfectly suited to this group, many of whose members are immersed in analytical thought and scientific methodology. Mooney talked about the importance of creativity and innovation in moving research forward—yes, applying scientific rigor to […]

2017-05-27T10:35:26-04:00September 17th, 2012|nursing perspective, nursing research|0 Comments
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Like ‘Being in Jail in a Way’: A Study Investigates How Anorexic Adolescents and Their Nurses View Inpatient Treatment

By Sylvia Foley, AJN senior editor

Bar the View by HereStanding, via Flickr

For adolescents with severe anorexia, experts have long relied on treatment in specialized pediatric acute care settings, using programs that are based on behavior modification principles and that promote stability through refeeding.

But what is it like to be a young inpatient in such a program? And how does the behavior modification approach affect the nurse–patient relationship? To learn more, nurse researcher Lucie Michelle Ramjan and colleague Betty I. Gill conducted a study in an Australian acute care facility. Their findings are reported in this month’s CE: Original Research feature, “An Inpatient Program for Adolescents with Anorexia Experienced as a Metaphoric Prison.”

The research. Ramjan, the study’s principal investigator, conducted in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 10 adolescent patients being treated for anorexia and 10 pediatric nurses. The interviews were audiotaped; the tapes were then transcribed verbatim, read and reread, and subjected to thematic analysis. As another writer has noted elsewhere, in qualitative research, metaphors often “illuminate the meanings of experiences.” In this study, the researchers found that both nurses and patients “consistently used the metaphor of prison life to articulate their experiences.”

That striking metaphor offered Ramjan and Gill a framework for […]

2016-11-21T13:09:31-05:00August 6th, 2012|nursing research, patient engagement|3 Comments
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