The View from the Other Side: When the Daughter is a Nurse

I knew where we were heading and it scared me. I didn’t want to have to think about decisions that would have to be made in the not so distant future. I didn’t want to be a nurse; I just wanted to be the daughter.

Flowers_in_the_field_(5832054482)I knew Marie was special the moment I met her. Her home was one where all were welcome, the coffee always hot and fresh, the house filled with family and friends, and everyone left with a full belly. She freely shared her opinion, whether or not a person sought out her advice.

I knew Marie for nearly 30 years. She was my mother-in-law. She was also my cheerleader, proud that I had come so far in my nursing career. She told everyone I was a nurse and often referred to me as her daughter rather than specifying that I was her daughter-in-law.

Fiercely loyal and loving of her large family, she always put their needs before hers. I worried about her because she smoked and rarely visited a doctor. With regard to health, she believed in the notion that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But slowly, health problems began cropping up. After a hospitalization for heart failure, she was diagnosed with COPD and hypertension.

Still, […]

2016-11-21T13:01:07-05:00June 30th, 2016|narratives, Nursing, nursing perspective, patient engagement|1 Comment
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Family Caregivers Increasing in Age, Numbers: How Can Nurses Help?

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

AJNFamilyCaregiverSupplementLast week, a new report from the National Alliance for Caregiving and AARP detailed the landscape of family caregiving in the United States. The majority (60%) of caregivers remain female (40% are men, a percentage that continues to rise). They average 49 years of age. In most cases, they are caring for a relative (typically, a 69-year-old female). On average, the caregiver spends 24 hours each week helping with daily activities and has been doing so for four years; one-third of caregivers still maintain a full-time job.

An estimated 34.2 million adults provided unpaid care to an adult 50 years or older in the previous 12 months; nearly one in 10 caregivers is 75 years or older—a typical example given in the report was a 79-year-old female caring for a 77-year-old spouse with Alzheimer’s disease, aging issues, or heart disease. Half of caregivers were thrust into caregiving and felt that they had no choice about taking on the responsibility of a loved one’s care; 22% of caregivers feel that their own health has suffered.

To raise awareness of their needs, in recent years AARP has championed the plight of family caregivers, collaborating with government and consumer organizations, and health care professionals. AJN, too, has worked with AARP on several projects to provide nurses with information to support family […]

2016-11-21T13:02:26-05:00June 10th, 2015|Nursing, nursing perspective, Patients, Public health|0 Comments
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Planning Postdischarge Care with Cognitively Impaired Adults

McCauley A patient performs the CLOX 1, a clock-drawing task used to assess patients for cognitive impairment. Photo by Ed Eckstein.

By Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

The transition from hospital to home can be fraught with pitfalls, especially if the patient in question is an older adult with multiple conditions and a not-so-prepared caregiver. The transitional care model, in which NPs coordinate care and provide follow-up care after discharge, has been shown to be successful in reducing hospital readmissions in this group of patients.

With Medicare levying penalties on hospitals with higher-than-average readmissions rates, the stakes aren’t just high for patients and their families. Might similar models of care also work with cognitively impaired adults?

In “Studying Nursing Interventions in Acutely Ill, Cognitively Impaired Older Adults,” a feature article in AJN‘s October issue (free until the end of October), Kathleen McCauley and colleagues from the University of Pennsylvania seek to answer this question, among others.

In the article, McCauley and colleagues describe the methodology and protocols used in their study, summarize their findings, and discuss some of the challenges in conducting research in the clinical setting. Among their findings is the important lesson that research involving cognitively impaired older adults must actively engage clinicians, patients, and family caregivers, as well as the need for hospitals to make cognitive screening of older adults who are hospitalized for an […]

2016-11-21T13:03:45-05:00October 15th, 2014|Nursing, nursing perspective, nursing research, Patients|0 Comments
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Some Essential AJN Resources on Care of Older Adults, Family Caregivers, More

800px-Woman-typing-on-laptopBy Shawn Kennedy, AJN editor-in-chief

August is one of my favorite months. Many people take time off, so the commute into AJN‘s Manhattan office is fairly easy. People’s pace seems to be a little bit slower; there seems to be less immediacy around responses to email. It’s a good time to catch up on reading manuscripts and other work I’ve had piled up.

If you’ve gone through your beach reading, here are a few useful collections on perennially important topics from our back pages:

If you’re just getting started in a nursing career, you might want to read a three-part series of articles, “Protecting Your License,” written by AJN contributing editor Edie Brous, who is a nurse and an attorney and writes on legal matters for the journal. Her series describes common myths about licensure and what steps to take to protect yourself if you are sued or brought up on charges by your state board of nursing. […]

2016-11-21T13:04:07-05:00August 11th, 2014|infectious diseases, Nursing, nursing perspective|1 Comment
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Come Into My Parlor

Amy Getter, MS, RN, lives in Eugene, Oregon, where, in her own words, she “works with people with life-limiting illness who are enrolled in a hospice wherever they consider ‘home.’”

by Ramon Peco/via Flickr by Ramon Peco/via Flickr

I fondly remember becoming acquainted with my first “parlor,” in a 100-year-old home that my family moved into during my teen years. The walls were dressed in faded, peeling, paisley-patterned wallpaper and a tarnished brass chandelier hung from the ceiling. French doors closed it away from the rest of the living area, giving it a slightly mysterious aura. Far-off city lights blinked at me from elongated paned windows. I immediately claimed it as my bedroom.

The word parlor (derived from the verb “to speak”) may have first been used in medieval monasteries. An “outer parlor” was designated for receiving outsiders and attending to business needs and the “inner parlor” was for the monks’ private use. During the mid-19th century, formal parlors evolved and could be found in homes like the one my family lived in.

Weddings, funerals (being “laid out”), and other social events occurred in the parlor. Home businesses emerged (such as “funeral parlors”—offering an option for laying out the deceased in someone else’s home!). In recent years, care of the infirm and preparation of the […]

2016-11-21T13:06:28-05:00September 27th, 2013|narratives, nursing perspective, nursing stories, patient experience|3 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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