Parents as Mentors: Observations of a Peds/NICU Nurse

By Jody Holland, MN, RN, neonatal ICU and pediatrics, St. Charles Medical Center, Bend, Oregon

The strength of parents.

Hospital, by boliston / via Flickr

We have all had and need mentors at some time in our career. The most influential mentors to me have been the parents of the infants and children who have been placed in my care. Parents do not ask for their child to be born early or develop a devastating illness, but these parents summon great strength when it’s needed.

I have countless memories of episodes that have made me pause and reflect on the courage and resolve of parents. I remember a family who stood by their child during a resuscitation and were an integral part of the decision-making process to end the resuscitation. This was long before research documented the benefits of this type of parental involvement.

Or the time when the parents of a child with a devastating head injury fulfilled their promise to their child to get married. In addition, the child also wanted to be the flower girl. They were married at their child’s bedside. The ICU staff followed their wishes and dressed the girl in an outfit of their choosing, placed flowers in her hair, and made a bouquet. The ceremony went off without a hitch—and I believe it […]

2017-05-01T09:29:17-04:00May 1st, 2017|Nursing|0 Comments
Read More

AJN in May: Venous Thromboembolism Update, Deep Tissue Pressure Injury Review, Much More

The May issue of AJN is now live. Here are some articles we’d like to bring to your attention.

CE Feature: Original Research: Creating an Evidence-Based Progression for Clinical Advancement Programs

The Institute of Medicine (IOM) and the Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) project have identified six nursing competencies and supported their integration into undergraduate and graduate nursing curricula nationwide. But integration of those competencies into clinical practice has been limited, and evidence for the progression of competency proficiency within clinical advancement programs is scant. Building on the competencies identified by the IOM and QSEN, the authors of this study developed eight nursing competency domains and 186 related knowledge, skills, and attitudes for professional nursing practice, then sought to validate them and to determine their developmental progression within a clinical advancement program.

CE Feature: Venous Thromboembolism: Updated Management Guidelines

Each year, as many as 900,000 cases of venous thromboembolism occur in the United States; between 100,000 and 300,000 cases end in death. This article presents an overview of venous thromboembolism—including its pathophysiology, risk factors, symptoms, and key clinical assessments—plus a review of recommendations from an updated American College of Chest Physicians guideline related to treatment options, nursing practice, patient education, diagnostic testing, and […]

2017-04-28T09:09:57-04:00April 28th, 2017|Nursing|0 Comments
Read More

Ongoing Article Series Helps Nurses Write for Publication

Do you have an idea, experience, or knowledge that you feel other nurses can benefit from? Most nurses outside of academia or the policy arena don’t think about writing for publication as something that they should or must do.

But in AJN’s ongoing four-part series, “Writing for Publication: Step By Step,” author Karen Roush, PhD, RN, FNP, highlights the need to make nurses’ voices heard:

Think about all you know and all you do as a nurse. Think about the clinical expertise you bring to your practice, the insights you’ve gained through experience. Think about the problems you solve, improving patient care or creating systems that run more effectively and efficiently. And think about the times you’ve been present at life-defining moments, at moments of suffering and renewal, at beginnings and endings. You carry all of this with you—knowledge and skills, wisdom and insight. It’s time to share it.

In the series, Roush, former clinical managing editor of AJN and an assistant professor at both Lehman College, Bronx, New York, and the Graduate Center, City University of New York, shares her experience and inside knowledge in writing and publishing in practical, easy-to-digest articles that take nurses through the writing process, from start […]

2017-04-24T09:53:25-04:00April 24th, 2017|Nursing|0 Comments
Read More

Earth Day 2017: An Important Role for Nurses

By Barbara Polivka, PhD, RN, FAAN, professor and Shirley B. Powers Endowed Chair in Nursing Research, University of Louisville, Kentucky

“… the symptoms or the sufferings generally considered to be inevitable and incident to the disease are very often not symptoms of the disease at all, but of something quite different—of the want of fresh air, or of light, or of warmth, or of quiet, or of cleanliness…”  -Florence Nightingale, Notes on Nursing: What it is and What it is Not (1859).

 

crocus shoots, early spring / Wikimedia Commons

As we celebrate the 46th Earth Day, it’s good to look back.

  • Earth Day was founded by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson as an environmental teach-in on April 22nd, 1970.
  • The first Earth Day celebration helped spur the creation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Air Act.
  • Earth Day became an international celebration in 1971 when the UN Secretary General talked about it at a Peace Bell Ceremony in New York City.

A time to think about how we affect the environment and are affected by the environment.

Health Care Without Harm (https://noharm.org/) is an international organization promoting environmental health and justice. If you aren’t familiar with Health Care Without Harm I urge you to go to their website to see how health care organizations are decreasing their environmental impact. Health care facilities are:

2017-04-21T08:26:16-04:00April 21st, 2017|environmental health, Nursing, Public health|0 Comments
Read More

Nurses vs. Computers: Predicting Risk of Patient Harm

Not All Signs of Potential Harm Are Quantifiable

From chego101, via Flickr

Hospital nurses have many, many responsibilities and tasks, but one of the most important is to ensure patient safety by assessing patients for changes that can signal worsening of a condition or a new potential harm. Creating special units like ICUs, recovery rooms, and step-down units; flags on charts; various alarmed monitors; and safety huddles are a few of the ways hospitals have tried to identify potential problems. Now we have computerized tools to do this—or do we?

The complaint I have heard most from nurses about the electronic health record (EHR) is its inability to capture all the nuances of patient care or various patient problems, especially those that don’t involve easily quantifiable measures like heart rate or lab values. (For more detail, read our November 2016 report on nurses’ concerns with EHRs.)

One cannot accurately use a check mark to convey certain patient behavioral parameters or the “can’t put my finger on it but something’s going on with this patient” assessment that experienced nurses often make. In the April issue of AJN, we published an important study that investigates just this issue: “Identifying Hospitalized Patients at Risk for Harm: A Comparison of Nurse Perceptions vs. Electronic Risk Assessment Tool Scores”

Deciding Whether to […]

2017-04-19T10:43:15-04:00April 19th, 2017|Nursing, nursing research, patient safety|1 Comment
Read More

Comment ground rules

1. Please be respectful.
2. We moderate all comments.

Content disclaimer

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.
Go to Top