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Vampire Nurses, PhDs, Your Best Moment as a Nurse: Today’s Notes from the Nursosphere

Here are some recent posts of interest we noticed on the nursing blogs. Many of these blogs can actually be found on our blogroll, so we hope you’re exploring what’s there from time to time, even if we know the list isn’t exhaustive and is probably missing some other excellent (and at least somewhat frequently updated) blogs.

It’s good to know that Will, the nurse/comic artist who shares his drawings at Drawing on Experience, has started posting again more regularly. One of his most recent efforts depicts a night shift nurse as a kind of vampire. It’s funny and, in a way, insightful. We give just a thumbnail version of it below on the right, in the interests of preserving the artist’s copyright; to see it enlarged, click the image and visit the version posted on his site, where you can also find a bunch more drawings, many about his life as a relatively new nurse.

The INQRI Blog (that INQRI stands for Interdisciplinary Nursing Quality Research Initiative, a real mouthful) has a new post about an increase in enrollment in nursing doctorate programs. Here’s an excerpt:

According to new data released recently by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN), enrollment in doctoral nursing programs increased significantly in 2010. The AACN believes that this shows a strong interest in both research-focused and practice-focused doctorates.

The post also connects […]

Jacob Molyneux, senior editor/blog editor2016-11-21T13:13:39-05:00March 30th, 2011|career, students|1 Comment

Feeling Just Beachy

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

Last week I wrote a post here about the feeling of well-being—what it is, how it’s measured, and whether or not nurses often experience it. I guess writing the post struck a chord with me. I sometimes (often) feel overwhelmed with responsibilities at work and home and wish there was more time for fun, rejuvenating activities, and relaxing with friends. With this in mind, I decided to accept an invitation from friends to come for a visit.

My husband and I took a leisurely two-hour drive on Saturday down to see old friends at their new home on a New Jersey barrier island, one block from the ocean. Although it was a very cold day, the sun was shining in a bright, blue, cloudless sky. We decided to brave the wind and bundled up and headed out for a walk on the beach.

The air had that salty-sun smell and the wind was blowing enough to make the water choppy and full of whitecaps—it was gorgeous and exhilarating, and we tramped about for an hour. Later, we headed out again, this time to wander around the point at the south end of the island, where migratory birds and turtle nests were protected. Nothing like an ocean wind to clear your head!

A good meal, some catch-up conversations and laughs—it was a fabulous day. At times, I could still hear that nagging part of my brain saying, “What about those e-mails you need to get out?” and “You have to […]

Jacob Molyneux, senior editor/blog editor2016-11-21T13:13:40-05:00March 28th, 2011|nursing perspective|2 Comments

Are You a Well Being?

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

A tweet from the UK’s Nursing Times recently caught my eye. It was directing Twitter followers to a post on its Web site, asking what “well-being” meant to them. The post discusses the work life vs. home life seesaw and whether readers’ chosen careers leave them time to enjoy other aspects of life. There’s actually a national well-being debate in the UK, where the Office for National Statistics is seeking public input in developing new measures of national well-being.

We measure well-being here in the U.S. too, with the CDC’s measures of health-related quality of life (HRQOL) index. While noting that “there is no consensus around a general definition of well-being,” the CDC sketches the concept of well-being in the following way:

“. . . at minimum, well-being includes the presence of positive emotions and moods (e.g., contentment, happiness), the absence of negative emotions (e.g., depression, anxiety), satisfaction with life, fulfillment and positive functioning. In simple terms, well-being can be described as judging life positively and feeling good. . . . physical well-being (e.g., feeling very healthy and full of energy) is also viewed as critical to overall well-being.”

Most people I know say they’re working harder than they ever did before. I see single parents and don’t know how they work full-time, deal with childrens’ schedules and needs, and make time for themselves. (I guess mostly they don’t—especially the part about making time for […]

Jacob Molyneux, senior editor/blog editor2016-11-21T13:13:41-05:00March 23rd, 2011|career, nursing perspective|12 Comments

Errors to Avoid in Scientific Publication, circa 1929

Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

Scholarly publication has been under fire because of lack of rigor and conflicts of interest. And authors seem to be clueless at times as to how things went so wrong.

Well, here’s some sage advice about common errors to avoid that I found in the July 1929 issue of AJN:

Jacob Molyneux, senior editor/blog editor2016-11-21T13:13:43-05:00March 21st, 2011|nursing research|0 Comments

Japan Earthquake Aftermath: What Nurses Need to Know About Radiation Exposure

By Maureen Shawn Kennedy, editor-in-chief

The pictures are horrifying. First a 9.0 magnitude earthquake, then a tsunami, and now the Japanese people are perilously close to another disaster from radiation leaking from damaged nuclear power plants.

The death toll, already in the thousands, possibly tens of thousands, will undoubtedly climb without the intervention from disaster relief organizations, which may be reluctant to send their responders into areas with high radiation. After its ships and crew were exposed to radiation from a leaking reactor (the New York Times reported that the deck crew on the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan was exposed to radiation that “caused them to receive a month’s worth of radiation in about an hour”), the U.S. Navy repositioned its ships further off the coast of Japan as a precaution, and is conducting relief operations from the north, away from the wind currents.

There’s been much discussion in the media about the effects of radiation, what levels are harmful, etc, and nurses may indeed receive questions from patients or families with members participating in relief efforts. Here are two articles from AJN that will help you answer questions (they’ll be free until April 18):