While the project was called Strengthening Hospital Nursing, much of it went beyond what has been thought of as the traditional role of nursing. Even so, the results resonate for nurses, according to study directors.
The coordination of care, increasingly important in these times of managed care, is managed by nurses, even though physicians issue orders. “Nurses are the ones who touch all the disciplines. That’s major learning for nurses,” says Mary Kay Kohles, MSW, RN, deputy director of the project and an administrator at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta.
Another “great lesson” for nurses is that they need to articulate their contributions to the services that are being provided and to communicate across disciplinary lines, Kohles said.
The project, funded by a $26 million grant from The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Pew Charitable Trusts, also pointed up the increasing demand for nurses to be flexible. At some institutions in the study, a nurse who takes care of a patient in an inpatient setting also follows the patient home to provide care there.
The project staff tried to develop tools and skills that professionals needed to think about their work differently, said Barbara Donaho, MA, RN, FAAN, the project’s director and a health consultant based in St. Petersburg, Fla. “This grant has clearly demonstrated that time and time again, if they do it in a collaborative mode, they will be more efficient and more effective with higher levels of satisfaction for the patient, the families, and professionals.”
For more information
For a free copy of the 118-page Celebrating the Journey: A Final Report, on the Strengthening Hospital Nursing demonstration project, call Barbara Donaho, MA, RN, FAAN, project director, (813) 522-6433, or Mary Kay Kohles, MSW, RN, deputy director, (404) 605-2453.