Nursing Issues

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Resources for new nursing graduates

Click here to view a helpful list of questions to ask when applying for a nursing position.


Master Plan for Nursing Education in Washington state

Like other states, Washington State is experiencing a nursing shortage that will worsen in the next few decades. An aging population is increasing demand for health care at the same time that an aging nursing workforce is retiring in large numbers. The nursing profession is challenged to maintain its excellence in knowledge and skills in a rapidly changing healthcare system, to increase its racial and ethnic diversity to better reflect the population, and to enhance access to quality education across the state.

The Master Plan for Nursing Education has been in development over the past two years through dialogue among multiple stakeholders. The Department of Health contracted with the Washington Center for Nursing to develop an overall plan for nursing education in this state. The Master Plan proposes a set of overlapping strategies focusing on four areas: competency, supply, diversity, and access.

Read the Master Plan for Nursing Education here.

Click here for other resources on the Master Nursing Plan.


2009 Forum on the Future of Nursing: Read the Summary

Overcoming the challenges in nursing is essential to overcoming the challenges in the health care system as a whole. Nurses are the largest segment of the health care workforce, and their skills and availability can directly affect quality, safety, and efficiency. Most nurses work in hospitals or other acute care settings, where they are patients’ primary, professional caregivers and the individuals most likely to intercept medical errors. However, because hospital systems and acute care settings are often complex and chaotic, many nurses spend unnecessary time hunting for supplies, filling out paperwork, and coordinating staff time and patient care, reducing the time they are able to spend with patients and delivering care.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative on the Future of Nursing, at the IOM, seeks to transform nursing as part of larger efforts to reform the health care system. As part of this Initiative, three forums were held to explore challenges and opportunities in nursing. The first forum, on October 19, 2009, focused on quality and safety, technology, and interdisciplinary collaboration in acute care; and speakers offered new strategies to allow nurses to provide higher-quality care.

Linda Arkava, an SEIU Healthcare 1199NW nurse from Swedish Medical Center in Seattle testified at this forum. You can read her testimony here.

Read a summary of the October 2009 Forum on the Future of Nursing: Acute Care

 

Nurses Week:Safe staffing saves lives

A recent study confirms what we’ve been saying all along: lower patient to nurse ratios save lives.

The study of nursing in California, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, by respected nurse researcher Linda Aiken, shows that hospitals with nurse to patient ratios aligned with the standards in the California law had significantly lower patient mortality, and their nursing staff reported lower burnout and job dissatisfaction.

Lower nurse to patient ratios reduce nurse workloads, improve recruitment and retention, and result in better patient care, according to a recent follow up study on the impact of the California nurse staffing law.

•    22,336 nurses surveyed in California, New Jersey and Pennsylvania
•    Two fewer patients per nurse on med-surg units in CA
•    14% fewer surgical deaths if New Jersey followed the California ratios
•    11% fewer surgical deaths if Pennsylvania had followed the California ratios
•    74% of staff nurses and 62% of nurse executives believe the quality of care in CA has increased as a result of the legislation

Read the full report here.

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Washington Center for Nursing

Visit the Washington Center for Nursing for more information on nursing issues, and how the WCN is contributing to the health and wellness of Washington State by ensuring that there is an adequate nursing workforce to meet the current and the future healthcare needs of our population.


Washington Center for Nursing


Forum on the Future of Nursing

To adequately prepare nurses for their pivotal leadership roles in tomorrow’s healthcare system, and to educate enough nurses to meet the needs, nursing education needs to change. The focus of these changes must emphasize safety,
chronic disease management, preventative care, care coordination, utilization of new technology and multidisciplinary care delivery for a very diverse population in multiple and nontraditional settings.

Read Diane Sosne's testimony from the IOM Forum on the Future of Nursing in Houston on February 22.

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2009 Ruckleshaus Report on Nurse Staffing

Read the 2009 Progress Report of the Ruckleshaus Nurse Staffing Steering Committee.

SEIU Healthcare 1199NW is a member of the Steering Committee, along with the WA State Nurses Association, WA State Hospital Association, UFCW 141, and the Northwest Organization of Nurse Executives.

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Charting Nursing's Future: Addressing the Quality and Safety Gap

Here are two issues of Charting Nursing’s Future—a publication of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation with reports on “policies that can transform patient care.”

Issue 10: Case Studies In Transforming Hospital Nursing and Building Cultures of Safety
Issue 11: How Nurses Are Shaped, and Being Shaped By, Health Information Technologies

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SEIU Healthcare 1199NW nurse participates in 'Future of Nursing' forum

Linda Arkava, an SEIU Healthcare 1199NW nurse at Swedish Medical Center, presented testimony at the Forum on the Future of Nursing in Los Angeles on October 19.

Linda conveyed used her own experience as a nurse and member of SEIU’s Nurse Alliance to share testimony that frontline nurses should be involved in the decisions and implementation of evidence-based policies, practices and healthy work environments for improved patient outcomes, increased RN professional satisfaction and increased safety for all.

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