WashYaHands

Information about becoming certified in Infection Control can be found at the Certification Board of Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc. web site http://www.cbic.org Having a CIC is a certification in infection control does not authorize practice as a CNS. A CNS is a registered nurse who has completed a master's degree program that is accredited to include clinical nurse specialist components (education and clinical practicum) in the curriculum. There may be a master's program with a CNS focus in infection control out there somewhere. Hope this helps answer your question.

The Maternal and Child Health Library might provide you with some interesting MCH public health issues to write about. the url is http://www.mchlibrary.info Click on annotated resource guides on the left for additional topics. Good Luck. Linda

Thanks for the link, Karen. I had the opportunity to attend the 2004 IHI Quality Conference where Dr. Don Berwick kicked off the 100,000 Lives Campaign. If you would like to watch a video of his speech you can go to http://www.ihi.org click on 100,000 Lives campaign link, scroll down and click on "speech announcing the campaign". It's about an hour long. The first 2 minutes is dry, but Don Berwick is an inspiring motivational speaker and a leader in improving the quality of healthcare both nation wide and internationally. He lays out the plan for the campaign. Linda

The site for the Institute for Healthcare Improvement http://www.ihi.org has alot of information about hospital quality including ideas, tools for measuring quality, and educational offerings. My QA position was recently eliminated, so I've moved on to other things. I really enjoyed QA. I gained many skills and much knowledge that I can use in other areas. Best of luck with your new position (both of you). Linda

These resources might help: An Introduction to Quality Assurance in Health Care by Avedis Donabedian Measuring Quality Improvement in Healthcare A Guide to Statistical Process Control Applications by Raymond G. Carey, PhD & Rober C. Lloyd, PhD. http://www.ncqa.org http://www.ahrq.gov Also, do a search for quality assurance in health care. There may be some helpful sites there. Hope this helps you out a little bit. Linda

Mary, The National Association of Clinical Nurse Specialists might have some information related to your specialty. They have an internet bulletin board where you can ask specific questions and touch base with others in your specialty. The url is http://www.nacns.org . My specialty is community health, so I can't offer much in the way of clinical expertise or knowledge of renal management. Congratulations...December is just around the corner. Linda

Hand written thank you notes are nice. We used to have a special bulletin board where anyone could post a thank you note to a coworker.

Since I paraphrased it from the direct quote that I used as an example, it would have to be cited. But, you're right in that If you use a fact that is common knowledge it would not have to be cited.

Here is an example of quotation and paraphrasing with cited references: "Unionization, once a dirty word in the medical world, is spreading" (Eastaugh, 1998, p. 46). Paraphrased: Unionization of medical professionals is increasing (Eastaugh, 1998). Either way you still have to cite a reference unless you are stating your own original idea. The difference is with paraphrasing you are not directly quoting from your source, but you are putting into your words what the source has said. I hope this helps. Good luck. Linda

I work with 30 people. Ten of us are nurses. During a special nurses week staff meeting it was announced that in our honor the company would be donating $20,000 to the local nursing college to provide ten $2,000 need based scholarships for local nursing students. The student recipients sent thank-you letters and those were shared with us as well. This was the most meaningful gesture I've ever experienced to honor nurses during nurses week.

There is a program that offers an MSN with a self-defined CSN specialty. Prior to beginning the program the student and graduate faculty advisor create the specialty courses. The created courses must meet stringent requirements for curriculum development. The created speciality courses are completed in addition to the core courses. The academic work and clinical practicum that you participate in must be related to the self-defined specialty, and your thesis work or comprehensive exam is centered around that specialty as well. A friend of mine completed this program with a Cardiac CNS specialty. http://web.uccs.edu/bethel/cns.htm scroll down for a brief description of the self-defined option.

the "c" indicates that the person is a candidate for an MSN degree. In other words, they have completed their thesis and awaiting graduation.

Glad I could help and very glad it went well for you!

My experience is that the informatics, clinical systems and data analysis pieces are vital in QA work. It's just as important as all of the other pieces of implementing a QI project. If you enjoy working with data, informatics, systems, and have an analytic mind it's a nice fit when coupled with nursing knowledge and skills.

Assuming that you’re working in a hospital QA setting, you can get some information about current practices to improve health care at the following sites. http://www.leapfroggroup.org you can search to find out if your facility participates in the Leap Frog for patient safety survey. And, you can find out how your hospital is doing for various measures. If your facility does participate in this survey, look around on the site to find out about the leap from survey and it’s purpose in the big picture of improving health care quality in case it comes up during your interview. JCAHO also has a site http://www.qualitycheck.org that you can surf around to find out how your hospital is doing with heart attack care, heart failure care, pneumonia and other measures. Become familiar with what JCAHO is interested in with regard to quality of care. The Institute for Healthcare Improvement http://www.ihi.org is an informative site. This organization recently kicked off a nationwide campaign called 100,000 Lives. The campaign focuses on 6 interventions that it is asking hospitals to implement and measure that will improve quality of health care. Since you have a background in critical care, the interventions that this campaign is promoting will make sense to you. Not sure if your particular hospital is formally participating, but it might be good info to know in case they are. If not, the site is packed with very good information related to Quality Improvement and Quality Assurance. QA is an exciting and growing field in health care today. It is especially exciting for the nursing profession to be involved in because we’ve always advocated quality and we have valuable input to achieve it. Best of Luck to you.

It's illegal, unethical, and yes, you could lose your license for it.

I've never heard of an official credential for a CNL, but according to a previous thread here it stands for Clinical Nurse Leader and is being considered as an advanced practice nurse credential. Clinical Nurse Specialists (CNS) are licensed registered nurses who have graduate preparation (Master or Doctorate) in nursing as a Clinical Nurse Specialist. Clinical Nurse Specialists are expert clinicians in a specialized area of nursing practice. The specialty may be identified in terms of: A Population (e.g. pediatrics, geriatrics, women’s health) A Setting (e.g. critical care, emergency room) A Disease or Medical Subspecialty (e.g. diabetes, oncology) A Type of Care (e.g. psychiatric, rehabilitation) A Type of Problem (e.g. pain, wounds, stress) Clinical Nurse Specialists practice in a wide variety of health care settings. In addition to providing direct patient care, Clinical Nurse Specialists influence care outcomes by providing expert consultation for nursing staffs and by implementing improvements in health care delivery systems. Clinical Nurse Specialist practice integrates nursing practice, which focuses on assisting patients in the prevention or resolution of illness, with medical diagnosis and treatment of disease, injury and disability. Research about Clinical Nurse Specialist practice demonstrates outcomes such as: Reduced Hospital Costs and Length of Stay Reduced Frequency of Emergency Room Visits Improved Pain Management Practices Increased Patient Satisfaction with Nursing Care Reduced Medical Complications in Hospitalized Patients

MSN = Master of Science in Nursing BC PMH = Board Certified Psychiatry Mental Health APRN = Advanced Practice Registered Nurse

1. I became a CNS because I like working in various roles. It makes the job interesting. I especially like measuring outcomes of projects that I design and help to implement. 2. My state grants prescriptive authority if the CNS has completed an advanced pharmacology course within their program of study. The CNS must work 1800 hours after graduation in a prescriptive role and have a collaborative agreement with an MD. 3. Benefits include working in a variety of roles, enhancing the quality of health care for both patients and staff. 4. Disadvantage is that not many people understand the value of the CNS or what they do. 5. My program was a 3 year MSN program (full time) with a clinical practicum component.

I work in Quality assurance and I develop/manage preventive health programs and disease management programs. I'm sometimes asked to do stuff for other departments. I would be frustrated if I were in your situation too. I know you're angry, but if you let it fester you'll only make yourself miserable. Everyone agrees that secretatial stuff is not your role. It's wrong for them to ask you to do it. Right now you're between the political "rock and a hard place". Take a step back, look at the situation as objectively as possible and decide for yourself how to handle it. If this is a one time thing, speak with your boss about it. She may be between that political rock and hard place too. If it's not a one time thing, talk to your boss and ask her exactly what your role is there. Be honest and professional about it. I agree that you are very smart, talented and articulate. Use those skills to navigate the organizational politics of your organization. If you decide to look elsewhere, it's their loss.

I'm sometimes put in a similar situation. I try to handle all requests asked of me, but when I'm really really swamped and the boss asks me to take on an additional project, I've learned to respond like this: "I don't mind taking on this new project, but the current projects that I'm working on, such as (insert projects here) are requiring 100% of my time. Which current project would you like for me to put on hold so I can accomplish this new one?" I also keep a list of all of my current projects with "next steps" listed by them. Each week I update the list (add any new projects, update the current ones, mark completed projects as done). It takes a little bit of my time, but if I get too overloaded, I can show it to my boss and ask her which project she thinks should be "bumped". I'm currently reading a book titled, Managing projects in organizations. How to make the best use of time, techniques, and people. by J. Davidson Frame. Your situation (and mine) is not uncommon. Sorry it's happened to you. I understand how much it sucks.

staple removal kits, suture removal kits, splints of various kinds for various body parts, braces, ice packs, Ace wrap, mole skin (is that how that's spelled?), wound care products, general medical supplies like thermometer, BP cuff, stethescope. I'm sure there's more.

staple removal kits, suture removal kits, splints of various kinds for various body parts, braces, ice packs, Ace wrap, mole skin (is that how that's spelled?), wound care products, general medical supplies like thermometer, BP cuff, stethescope. I'm sure there's more.

The research problem is the situation in need of a solution or improvement. It may state a descrepancy between the way things are and the way things ought to be. The problem identifies an area of concern. The problem statement is basically nailing down the problem and presenting it in sentence form. The purpose statement is generated from the problem and identifies the specific goal or aim of the study. The goal might be to identify, describe, explain, or predict a solution to a situation. The research questions are concise, clear statements of the purpose of the study. It is also generated from the problem. The hypothesis is a formal statement of the expected relationship between 2 or more variables in a specified population. The research question and hypothesis are formulated to bridge the gap between the more abstractly stated research problem and purpose. I'm not sure if this helps much, but I hope it does.

The research problem is the situation in need of a solution or improvement. It may state a descrepancy between the way things are and the way things ought to be. The problem identifies an area of concern. The problem statement is basically nailing down the problem and presenting it in sentence form. The purpose statement is generated from the problem and identifies the specific goal or aim of the study. The goal might be to identify, describe, explain, or predict a solution to a situation. The research questions are concise, clear statements of the purpose of the study. It is also generated from the problem. The hypothesis is a formal statement of the expected relationship between 2 or more variables in a specified population. The research question and hypothesis are formulated to bridge the gap between the more abstractly stated research problem and purpose. I'm not sure if this helps much, but I hope it does.