As a nurse, have you ever been praised for your work with a patient? The Boston Globe is holding a Salute to Nurses award program for people to nominate local nurses who have exceeded their usual duties and provided noteworthy care. The nurses’ stories will be told through stories, photos, and videos. The awards will be announced in early May. Check out the site to read some of the heartfelt stories from previous years’ winners. Does...  Read More »

Nursing school enrollment increased. A preliminary survey released by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) shows that entry-level baccalaureate nursing programs increased enrollment by 6.1% from 2009 to 2010. The AACN notes this is the tenth straight year that enrollment in BSN programs has increased, but it noted that faculty shortages still prevent further increases. The survey used data from 648 nursing schools, out...  Read More »

Nurses give their patients time, attention, nursing care and assessment, and even find time to offer a sympathetic hand to hold. But a nurse in Billings, MT, gave one of her patients something more: one of her kidneys. Vickie Lindt, a nurse at Billings Clinic, went under the knife to give her patient, Roger Gravgaard, the kidney transplant her desperately needed. Though the surgery happened in August, Lindt and Gravgaard are only now going...  Read More »

Susan Hassmiller, PhD, RN, FAAN, senior advisor for nursing at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, is spending her summer vacation doing something extraordinary. She is not spending her days soaking up the sun, or taking a cruise to Alaska. Instead she is traveling in Europe, learning about the life and work of Florence Nightingale. Throughout Hassmiller’s journey across Europe, she is blogging about her experience. Her trips marks...  Read More »

Nominations are open for the HCPro 2010 Nursing Image Awards, which honor nurses whose leadership, teamwork, or clinical expertise embodies an image of nursing excellence and contributes to improving patient care, quality outcomes, nurse satisfaction, and the healthcare environment. HCPro is searching for nurse leaders and staff who have helped elevate the image of nursing. Awards will be presented to an individual or team of nurses and...  Read More »

A new movement is quietly creeping into healthcare, and its silencing effect is being felt at one New York hospital. Press Ganey reports, which measure patient satisfaction, have long included noise level on it surveys, and some hospitals, like St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Utica, NY, are working to ensure noise doesn’t disrupt a patient’s stay. The hospital is working to reduce noise levels in an effort to increase patient safety...  Read More »

An integral part of handling a patient’s anger is letting the person know you understand the story, letting him or her know that you get it, or showing the person that you empathize with him or her. Recall that empathy means you recognize, perceive, and directly connect with the emotion of another. It is different from sympathy, which means you feel bad because of another person’s situation. Empathy is patient-centered. Sympathy...  Read More »

The care a nurse delivers is undoubtedly critical to his or her patients’ health. Not so evident is how critical this care is to the economy, but the American Nurses Association (ANA) aims to change this viewpoint with a new study. The ANA has released The Economic Value of Professional Nursing, a study published in the journal Medical Care that calculates the economic worth of nursing. The study was proposed in 2003 in an effort...  Read More »

It’s a new year, which one can anticipate will come with more changes in the dynamic field of healthcare. Experts tell us that what we know today will be outdated in three to seven years, so it becomes imperative that we stay up-to-date. Here are some tips to keep your nursing knowledge current: Attend conferences. Although conferences can be a bit expensive to attend, they can accomplish a lot in a small amount of time. Many specialty...  Read More »

Are nurses more honest than teachers? Are their ethical standards higher than those of physicians? According to a recent survey, the answer to both questions is yes. Nurses topped Gallup’s 2008 annual Honesty and Ethics of professions survey for the seventh year in a row. More than 1,000 Americans aged 18 or older participated in the survey, rating the ethics and honesty of 21 types of workers. Nurses won the vote of 84% of participants,...  Read More »