Something Like Grace

By Marcy Phipps, RN, a regular contributor to this blog. Her essay “The Love Song of Frank” was published in the May (2012) issue of AJN.

ViewFromPlaneWindowMark was in town to be the best man in an old friend’s wedding—on a vacation, of sorts—when the unthinkable happened and he was involved in a horrendous traffic accident. He was ejected from his rental car. His injuries were severe and life threatening.

Mark’s family was halfway across the country. Getting to Mark quickly seemed impossible. But this is where the story takes a turn:

Mark’s family found a flight leaving that morning from their local airport, with the exact number of available seats that they needed. As they bought the tickets, they explained the nature of their emergency. They got to the airport in the nick of time. While checking in, they were approached by an airline employee who asked if they’d already arranged a rental car. They told him that they hadn’t—they hadn’t even stopped to get their clothes.

They didn’t know it at the time, but the employee who’d approached them was the pilot of the plane. He’d learned of the family emergency and held the plane for them. He knew how serious Mark’s accident had been, as he’d happened to drive right past the accident scene on his way to the airport before the first leg of the flight.

When the plane landed, the pilot requested that Mark’s family […]

2016-11-21T13:06:57-05:00July 22nd, 2013|nursing perspective, Patients|4 Comments
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Behind Our Ambivalence About Flu Vaccines

By Amy M. Collins, editor

Influenza virus particle/CDC

Tis the season to start thinking about getting the flu vaccination. Every year I consider doing so, but due to my own personal vaccine angst I usually decide to just take my chances (while simultaneously lecturing elderly family members to make sure they get theirs, of course).  Working in Manhattan, with the vaccine available at most pharmacies and even vaccine access through work, gives me very little reason to forgo vaccination. And my theory that I am young and strong and can brave illness gets weaker as I pass the point of being able to comfortably claim youth. Riding the subway every day amid a festival of germs reminds me that I should know better.

The vaccine has caused a stir over the past few years: during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, people worried about whether or not to get the new combined vaccine, and the question of mandatory vaccination for health care workers remains a hot topic even now.

But a new report, The Compelling Need For Game-Changing Influenza Vaccines, released by scientists at the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, suggests that the flu vaccine may not be as effective as it is touted to be. According to the report, influenza vaccinations provide only modest protection for healthy young and middle-aged adults, and little if any protection for those 65 and older—those who are […]

2016-11-21T13:08:55-05:00November 9th, 2012|Nursing|3 Comments
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Nurse Staffing: Are the Brits on the Right Track?

By Maureen Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

hazard/jasleen kaur, via Flickr

According to an article at Nursing Times, hospitals in England may be required to publish “nurse-to-bed” ratios as part of an overall “dashboard” of indicators to measure  performance. While some say this is a step forward, UNISON, the public service union that represents nurses, argues that the better ratio to measure is nurse-to-patient and that variables in patient acuity should also be considered.

Nurse staffing has become an issue in National Health Service hospitals and in April UNISON released results of a survey of over 1,500 nurses and other health care workers about their shifts during the 24-hour period of March 6. The vast majority of respondents (73%) felt they did not have “enough time to spend with patients to deliver dignified, safe, compassionate care.” The Royal College of Nursing also supports mandatory safe-staffing ratios that take into account the skill mix of RNs to “health care support workers” or nursing assistants. 

Here in the United States, California is the only state to achieve any legislation for mandatory hospital staffing and it is a “minimum” nurse-to-patient ratio. While similar legislation has been introduced in a few other states and nationally, it hasn’t advanced.

The ANA does not support mandatory minimum ratios per se, noting in its Principles for Nurse Staffing (2nd edition), released earlier this […]

2016-11-21T13:09:48-05:00June 26th, 2012|Nursing|54 Comments
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Big Changes for New York Nurses

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

On Thursday, May 17, the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) held a special members-only meeting at New York City’s Jacob Javits Center to vote on bylaw changes that will drastically alter the future of the organization, morphing it from a professional association into a union. One of the key changes had to do with who could hold office in the organization: going forward, only bedside nurses, retirees, and “non-statutory” supervisors (i.e., those not able to hire or fire employees) would be eligible for office.

Other changes include eliminating the position of CEO and changing it to that of executive director, in order “to better reflect the union’s democratic roots and greater accountability to working nurses,” and a decision to push for nurse–patient staffing ratio legislation in the next session.

The NYSNA, which with 37,000 members, was founded in 1901 and is the oldest state nursing association in the country. Until January, when it was suspended for one year, it was the largest constituent member association of the ANA.

According to ANA documents, the NYSNA violated ANA bylaws by engaging in “dual unionism” when its newly elected board of directors replaced the CEO with Julie Pinkham, who is also the executive director of the Massachusetts Nurses Association (MNA). The MNA had disaffiliated from ANA in the past, along with the California Nurses Association, and were founding members of National Nurses United. The ANA […]

2016-11-21T13:10:04-05:00May 21st, 2012|career|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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