The true meaning of continuing education

[Peeps Mcarthur]

I'm really not shocked that nobody here seems to be expanding on their base knowledge. Nursing school isn't all easy and the strain you can feel in the "real" world of nursing once you hit the floor and all the new skills to master can make continuing education look like just an annoyance to satisfy licensing requirements, but once you've settled into a daily routine don't you get curiouse about some of those "blank spots" that seem vaguely like something you used to be intimately familiar? Don't you always have something to learn?

There must be somebody out there that is using some time to better themselves as practitioners.................do I have the wrong audience? Perhapse no good can come of knowledge outside of curriculum as a nurse. Maybe that's just reserved for the doctors and wannabees......uhmm?

Let's find out.

P.S.

If you would please show the board what you use to expand your skills and how you utilize them......Texts, CD-roms, programs....ETC

[James Huffman]

I dislike mandatory continuing ed because the system is a farce. Pushed heavily by CEU suppliers (wonder why ... ), mandatory CE is almost always a measure of butt-time: how long I sat in a chair at a given offering. Very seldom is something like reading or other more private learning valued or even taken into account.

Nurses who value their careers will usually keep learning, whether formally or informally. The rest will do what is necessary to keep a license. I'm not sure what can be done about those who don't want to learn, but mandatory continuing ed is not the answer.

Jim Huffman, RN

http://www.networkfornurses.com

[Dr. Kate, BSN, RN]

While mandatory CE may not be the best answer, there are far more nurses who would never learn anything new than those who would and do go out after it themselves. It's a pity.

What's more distressing to me is the amazing number of people responding who refer to nursing books that are minimally 2 years out of date at the time of publication, just a fact of life in the publishing world, and make no mention of reading journals. The basic M/S ones (AJN, RN, NursingXX) are goood starts but there's a world of research and growth of nursing as a clinical science going on that is not going to hit the textbooks for several years. MDs read the research literature as a matter of course. It's time nurses did the same thing. [i'll get off the soapbox now.]

[Peeps Mcarthur]

James,

CEU's= Butt time!:chuckle Exactly. If there ever was a measurement of "bare minimun" I guess that would be it. I've completed CEU's in another field(reimbursed mind you) and I couldn't remember what it was five minutes after I had my certificates and stepped out of there. I remembered more from the sports page that I read at lunch break.

Effort needs to be made to do remedial and current subject matter AND use your references to make sure your on the right track AND.....as Kate says, Keep aprised of current research. Very good point. As long as those journals aren't snoozers :zzzzz .........Where do we get enthusiasm to purge ourselves of complacency?

By never letting it build up. I think journals would be a good means to that end.

[James Huffman]

I'm going to disagree slightly with Peeps: about snoozers. Some journals are going to be snoozers, and that's OK. Not every issue is worth reading, and certainly not every article. Some, for example, will be of no interest to you individually, and it's no crime to pass them by. You're not in school any more (well, some of you are) and no teacher is sitting over you making sure you read every word of every journal you get. I encourage skimming journals, tearing out articles you want to read carefully, and throwing the rest away.

And if you have a foot-high stack of old journals you're going to read "when you have the time," throw them out and start over. (Note to self: you're never going to have the time). There's nothing more depressing than dutifully sitting down to read journals because you think you ought to. And if you have the bad habit of saving every issue of every journal ... well, what are you, a library? This works well when you're 23 ... it starts to get a bit overwhelming a few years later.

And don't worry about the cost of a journal. It's minimal, and a factor not worth considering. I just found an online source that has -- for example -- AJN for $9.97 a year. Nursing 2002 for $42.97 a year.

Why do I say it's nothing? Because I found an idea in Nursing80 (which shows how elderly I am ;-), put it to work in my practice, and the idea has made me thousands of dollars over the years. Do you think my subscription to Nursing was worth whatever few dollars it cost me that year? That one idea was worth thousands to me. Keep up with your field, keep engaged, and you will find that nursing just might be a little more fun.

Jim Huffman, RN

http://www.networkfornurses.com

[Agnus]

Well said Jim I subscribe to about a half dozen journals half are pure research. The research ones can easily be viewed as snoozers but I find somethng useful to me every month in each of them.

I also agree if you are saving journanls to read get out the trash bag it will never happen. Even if there are "interesting" articles that you want to read. There is only so much time in a day and next month you will have a whole new batch of articles. If it isn't interesting enough to read in a month then it really is not that important to you at this time.

Journals tend to cycle. A simular article will appear later or in another journal and will be current when you do read it.

[Peeps Mcarthur]

How interesting this is to find out what we're really made of on this board...uhmm......Only 9% response rate from those that veiwed questions about increasing/maintaining your knowledge.

Four of the respondants thought you could gain knowledge by some kind of osmosis, but the rest of all that viewed the questions answered the poll in favor of "whatever it takes" and 1/2 of those responding to the poll felt strongly enough to give examples and suggestions.

I have a feeling that those posters are considered the leaders in their units and the ones that passed on the subject alltogether are the nurses shaking their heads over why they never seem to get anywhere in their careers.

Just a thought.

[Agnus]

I generally ignore polls. And often the options offered don't apply to my situation.

Some of us are more vocal than others.

I don't think it is fair to pass judgement on someone who has choosen not to say anything just because they chose not to say anything. Geeze

Not everyone has to comment on everything they see, important to them or not.

You also have to keep in mind that the so called number of persons viewing a thread is deceiving. If I view it 10 times then it will be recorded that 10 people viewed it when there was only one.

[micro, RN]

good post peeps.....

agnus.......good point.........

continuing education a must.........

but I do not always continually educate myself.....

sometimes i just chill.........

here i am commenting on this because I see it.....

hehehehehehehehehehehehe

p.s. went to mechanical ventilation class today.....

[Peeps Mcarthur]

The number of people veiwing a thread titled "Nurse/Media connection" was twice as much. Another post titled "Do nurses eat their young?" got 6 times as many, yet another post titled simply "just go pee" will undoubtedly pass them both soon:rolleyes: . I think there's a corelation between views and interest and posts, but it's not like I'm writing a thesis or anything ya know.

I imagine that some people that were "lurkers" were interested in the topic responses enough to visit again. Some people never respond no matter what. The number of members on this board far exceeds The people that post. The "views" always exceed the poll numbers and the poll numbers always exceed the posts. The response to a poll is anonymouse so you really have to have a complete lack of involvement in the issue not to vote.

No mystery there.

Those that lead always exceed "standard". Leadership in a given profession is not a title, it's being an example of professional character. Doing more than just CEU's "demand" is leadership.

I don't post on polls that don't pertain to me either and certainly don't post a response. I really only wanted to hear from the leaders of our profession anyway or I would have titled the post "doing the bare minimum and still thinking your a professional"

Nursing has an image problem and this is one of the signs.

Look around at work and I'm willing to bet that you would be considered one of the leaders.

Taking all of this into consideration, I don't think it was too much of a stretch to speculate that leaders would post at least a poll response.

[nur20]

Glad to see how the votes are leaning, Any nurse worth her salt knows that learning never stops. This is a lifetime commitment or at least as long as you are in this field. Or for that matter any other field.Ceu's offered are usually something that you;ve already covered, or to satisfy renewal or whatever. Doesn't do much to increase your knowledge base.It is a duty to stay abreast of changes in your area, new technology, new meds etc, or just to heighten your skill or knowledge of somethng you didn;t grasp in school or experience.A nurses mind should be like a sponge

[micro, RN]

Originally posted by Peeps Mcarthur

The number of people veiwing a thread titled "Nurse/Media con nection" was twice as much. Another post titled "Do nurses eat their young?" got 6 times as many, yet another post titled simply "just go pee" will .............

Nursing has an image problem and this is one of the signs.

Look around at work and I'm willing to bet that you would be considered one of the leaders.

Taking all of this into consideration, I don't think it was too much of a stretch to speculate that leaders would post at least a poll response.

Peeps.......you have initiated and carrying a valid point related to our profession, continuing education and leadership(formal and more that informal) within nursing........

A nurse that cares about their nursing career and wants to give the best care possible can not do that without actively seeking and acquiring education from variety of mediums and forms......

I am weighing two routes this year myself....will decide one soon.....not that one will preclude the other.....

But I think another thing that occurs on this GREAT BB called ALLNURSES.com is that sometimes people/nurses/health care workers come here for education and learning, sometimes comes to destress related to this "crazy days and nights" field that we deal with daily........and sometimes just comes on to chill, shoot the breeze and not think nursing at all.....at least not seriously.....

Keep peeping Peeps.....you are the greats....... :D

[Peeps Mcarthur]

Yea Micro, the significantly insignificant posts pertaining to Media and nurse eaters including a-hole docs need to be here for everyone to blow off steam. It's a good thing.......absolutely.

Well said everybody. Education is never finished.

Speaking of which................