Nurs Econ
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As the most influential catalysts for health care reform in America, the time for nurses to emulate wellness and prevention has never been more critical. By creating healthy habits for ourselves, we flourish as ambassadors of self-care for our patients, families, colleagues, and communities. By taking care of ourselves first, we bring positive energy and vitality to work that positively affects others and influences the overall landscape. In essence, the practice of self-care should be expected as part of the professional role of nursing.
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The traditional means of planning nurse staffing for operating rooms are either poorly translated to the setting or do not provide decision makers with a platform to defend their needs, especially in an era of health care reform. The surgical operations department of the Cleveland Clinic initiated a quality improvement project aimed at applying a scientific method to operating room staffing. ⋯ Using an objective, scientific method allows position requests to be approved quickly and allows managers to feel much more comfortable functioning in a "lean" mode because they know needed positions will be approved quickly. Managers and directors also have found that graphically depicting numbers of vacant positions, as well as staff in orientation, could quickly relate a story visually rather than getting "bogged down" in narrative (often losing finance administrators along the way).
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In this presidential election, as the largest group of health care providers, nurses are witness to the impact of effective and failed health care policies across all health care settings on individuals, communities, agencies, and states. Nurses have a responsibility to not only be informed and participating voters, but we also need to inform those around us on how the current health policies are improving or preventing the delivery of access to quality, cost-effective care. Nurses have the opportunity and responsibility to be key informants regarding the impact of health care reform on the health care delivery system, on the profession, and on health care outcomes. The collective voice of 3.1 million nurses could change the results of this close election.
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Palliative care is poised to become a universally available approach to health care which addresses both the needs of patients and families experiencing serious, progressive, and life-threatening illness, and also the costs of delivering such needed services. Palliative care and hospice are part of a continuum of care with palliative care provided at any time during the illness trajectory, while hospice care is offered at the end of life. Within the context of health care reform, we believe palliative care addresses critical economic imperatives while enhancing quality of life even as death approaches. As leaders in health care, advance practice nurses, specifically, and the nursing community in general are best positioned with the knowledge, expertise, and commitment to advance the specialty of palliative care and lead the way in the reform of America's health care system.