If Nurses Are War Heroes, They Deserve Real and Lasting Support

Matthew Waring/Unsplash

The rhetoric of war is regularly applied to health care, whether we’re talking about a patient “fighting” cancer or “frontline” workers like nurses engaged in a “battle” or a “war” against a new infectious disease. This is a habit beloved of speech makers, academics, and journalists, and it’s likely to continue.

With strong metaphors comers real responsibility.

Rather than decrying this practice in favor of a more purely accurate use of language, the author of this month’s Viewpoint, Lorri Birkholz, DNP, RN, NE-BC, an assistant professor of nursing at Chatham University in Pittsburgh, argues that the choice to use such language comes with responsibility.

“If war language is going to be used to define this pandemic and the nurses caring for patients, then legislation must ensure care for their acute and long-term physical and mental well-being.”

Birkholz notes that federal COVID-relief legislation limited provisions for frontline workers to temporary hazard pay and mandated sick leave—far short, by way of comparison, of that received by 9/11 first responders or returning war veterans. […]

2022-01-24T09:56:24-05:00January 24th, 2022|Nursing|0 Comments
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AJN’s Top 5 Guest Blog Posts of 2021

One of my roles as a senior editor at AJN is to edit and maintain AJN’s blog. We try to publish a new post two to three times each week.

A percentage of these are original first-person nursing stories and perspectives by nurses in various specialties, from critical care to community health to oncology to school nursing. I often think of these as the lifeblood of the blog, the posts that can really reach people at the feeling level, and I am always grateful to receive them—from regular or first-time authors. These posts can be heartbreaking or gently humorous, or both. The range of styles and voices is wide.

Other equally important posts are those by nurses with an argument to make about an urgent issue in practice or policy. Some of these give rise to a certain amount of debate and stimulate further discussion in the nursing community.

In addition, a fair number of short posts are by AJN editors, in some cases bringing to bear their own clinical or personal experience as they address a matter of concern like nurse staffing, or providing essential context about why they think you should read an article found in that month’s issue.

As we’ve done in the past near the start of […]

2022-01-19T10:38:00-05:00January 19th, 2022|Nursing|0 Comments
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Migraines: A Comprehensive Review of the Most Debilitating Primary Headache Type

r. nial bradshaw / flickr creative commons

This month’s CE feature article, Diagnosing and Managing Migraine, is one I’m sure many readers will relate to, and perhaps even find some answers in for their own headaches.

Like many women, I could count on experiencing at least one each month—classic menstrual migraines—that would begin with a visual aura of wavy lines that made reading or driving impossible. Sometimes, taking acetaminophen or ibuprofen right at the onset of the aura and relaxing/lying down, could prevent it from progressing further.

Otherwise, I would become overly sensitive to lights and sounds and develop a pounding headache and nausea that made me retreat to a dark, quiet room for several hours until the headache passed.

The most debilitating type of primary headache.

The authors note that “90% of the U.S. population will develop a headache within their lifetime.” Migraine, the most debilitating type of primary headache (that is, when the headache is the disorder as opposed to being secondary to other causes), occurs in about 12% of the population. I was surprised that while prevalence is fairly equally distributed among boys and girls prior until puberty (2.5 or 2.4 percent), it changes dramatically post-puberty:

“The greatest difference between the sexes occurred between the ages of 20 and 40, when […]

2022-01-14T16:11:56-05:00January 14th, 2022|Nursing|1 Comment
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Recent Study: Electrolyte Disorders Common in Thiazide Diuretic Users

  • Hyponatremia and hypokalemia occur in approximately 20% of patients who take thiazide diuretics.

Thiazide diuretics are widely used in the treatment of hypertension, yet their use is associated with electrolyte disorders. Researchers investigated the prevalence of and risk factors for hyponatremia and hypokalemia in patients taking thiazide diuretics, substance-specific risks for these electrolyte disorders, and whether the use of thiazides is associated with a higher risk of syncope and falls.

The cross-sectional analysis by Ravioli and colleagues published in the American Journal of Medicine included all adults admitted to the ED in a one-year period whose sodium and potassium levels were measured on admission. The researchers conducted detailed chart reviews for all patients and screened for a history of syncope or falls.

Of the 20,421 patients for whom sodium and potassium measurements were available, 1,604 were taking thiazide diuretics regularly.

Acute kidney injury was more common in thiazide users than in nonusers (21.4% versus 7.2%). Hyponatremia and hypokalemia were also significantly more common in patients taking thiazides versus nonusers (22.1% versus 9.8% and 19% versus 11%, respectively).

[…]

2022-01-12T11:02:34-05:00January 12th, 2022|Nursing|0 Comments
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Nursing Resources: A Helpful Guide on Marijuana and Marijuana Products

As a psychiatric NP, I’m required to ask patients about the drugs they are currently taking, whether legally or illegally. This is important information to know regarding patients’ overall health, as well as for deciding which medication is safe to prescribe for them. With the recent changes in cannabis legalization, more and more patients who report using medical or recreational marijuana are being seen in health care environments.

More patients using cannabis products.

Staying knowledgeable of the effects, adverse effects, and potential interactions of marijuana is therefore critical for those of us caring for patients. Yet there isn’t much focus on marijuana education in the general training of health care professionals and cannabis is often not included in drug guidebooks. […]

2022-01-07T14:11:20-05:00January 7th, 2022|Nursing|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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