Legislative Network for Nurses articles from January 2006

Legislative Network for Nurses archives from January 2006

Bush signs FY06 funding bill; nurse advocates disappointed.(Budget)
January 9, 2006... For nurse advocates hoping for increased funding for education and practice, the new year has started out on a disappointing note. President Bush Dec. 30, 2005, signed fiscal year 2006 appropriations legislation for the Department of Health...

Home care trend continues; Senate disappoints nurses.
January 9, 2006... Home health nurses likely will see a continued trend of "house calls" to care for the elderly, according to home health care experts. Home health nurses warn, however, that recent action in the Senate may cause a delay in Medicare reimbursement...

NLN Reports increase in RN program enrollment but warns problems remain.
January 9, 2006... The country has experienced an increase in applications, admissions and enrollments in nursing programs at all levels, according to a preliminary report from the National League for Nursing released last month, Karen Klestzick, a spokesperson...

Maryland makes educating more nurses a priority.
January 9, 2006... Maryland may experience some relief from its critical shortage of nurse faculty and bedside nurses thanks to funding that will be used to increase the capacity of nursing programs. The Maryland Health Services Cost Review Commission, the...

Survey measuring their satisfaction.
January 9, 2006... The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services plans to invite 25,000 randomly selected health care providers to complete a survey measuring their satisfaction with services performed by the contractors that annually process and pay more than...

Transmission of tuberculosis.
January 9, 2006... The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Dec. 30, 2005, issued updated guidelines for preventing the transmission of tuberculosis in health care settings. The report updates recommendations issued in 1994 to reflect shifts in the...

Nurses' work environments.
January 9, 2006... The health care community needs to work harder to improve nurses' work environments in order for the country to meet its future health care needs, the Dec. 12, 2005, issue of Newsweek reported. Experts say that nursing is "crucial to patient...

Rapid response team.(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... As part of its efforts to improve the quality of care in the nation's hospitals and to improve the work environment for nurses, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has awarded grants to nine organizations to increase the adoption of rapid...

Trade policies.
January 9, 2006... The American Nurses Association has joined a number of public health organizations in filing a lawsuit demanding that corporate interests be balanced with public interest representation on U.S. Industry Trade Advisory Committees that advise the...

Higher salaries.
January 9, 2006... In a report issued recently by its Nurse Faculty Shortage Task Force, the American Federation of Teachers recommends higher salaries for nurse educators and more public and private funding for nursing programs. Pointing out that tens of...

Nurse-to-patient ratio.
January 9, 2006... A study conducted by researchers at the University of Texas reveals that patients undergoing common cancer surgeries have a reduced risk of mortality at hospitals with higher levels of staffing. The study, published in the American Cancer...

Patient handoff.(Patient Outcomes)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... A study in the December issue of the journal Academic Medicine found that there are few systems to deal with patient handoff when one physician leaves the hospital and another takes over. The result is that the handoff routinely goes awry...

Effective care.(Pay-for-performance)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... Pay-for-performance has the potential to increase the use and quality of "effective care" but is unlikely to help bring down the rising costs of health care, says a new study sponsored by the Commonwealth Fund. Effective care is therapy that is...

Medication safety technologies.(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... Cost is a major barrier to broader adoption of medication safety technologies by small rural hospitals, reports a new national study. "The finding of significant relationships between financial status and pharmacist staffing, use of technology,...

Arizona.(Arizona State University College of Nursing)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... Arizona: The Arizona State University College of Nursing has expanded its programming with the creation of an Office for International Nursing and Healthcare. The new program is designed to provide nursing students with a real-life perspective...

Arkansas.(State News)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... Arkansas: Lawmakers in Arkansas learned recently that some 1,500 qualified students were turned away from 54 nursing schools in the state last year because of a shortage of qualified instructors. Faith Fields, executive director of the Arkansas...

California.(State News)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... California: A growing number of California hospitals are offering nurses flexible scheduling options and other incentives to work odd-hours shifts in an effort to reduce their reliance on costly temporary nurses. Hospital administrators say...

Illinois.(State News)
January 9, 2006... Illinois: Recruiters from nursing schools, medical institutions and corporations are refocusing their hiring efforts to attract more men to the profession, according to an article recently published in the Chicago Tribune. Some nursing schools...

Kansas.(State News)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... Kansas: In an effort to increase the supply of doctorally prepared nurses, the University of Kansas School of Nursing last month announced the creation of an online PhD program. "There are many nurses who want to study at the doctoral level but...

Missouri.(State News)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... Missouri: A recent study about the health care workforce in Missouri, compiled by the Missouri Hospital Association, shows that the vacancy rate for all hospital positions is less than 10 percent--the worrisome level experienced in 2001 and...

North Carolina.(State News)
January 9, 2006... North Carolina: North Carolina's nurse employers reported significant difficulty recruiting and hiring nurses last year, according to a recently released report from the North Carolina Center for Nursing, titled "Shortage Measures for Nursing...

Mental Health Parity Act of 1996.(Legislation)
January 9, 2006... * The House and Senate late last month approved a one-year extension of the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996, which has been extended each year since its expiration in 2002. While this congressional action maintains the protections afforded by...

The American Association of Diabetes Educators.(Opportunities)
January 9, 2006... * The American Association of Diabetes Educators has issued a call for systematic review papers for a special issue focusing on the evidence-based practice strategy recommendations of the AADE 7 Self-Care Behaviors (Healthy Eating, Being...

Cultural Transformation.(Resources)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has published "White Paper on Cultural Transformation in Health Care," an assessment of cultural transformation in health care organizations across the country. Author Bobbi Kimball spoke to 40 executives from...

Severe hyperbilirubinemia.(Resources)(Brief Article)
January 9, 2006... To help prevent hyperbilirubinemia in newborns, the Association of Women's Health and Neonatal Nursing has published a new monograph designed to empower health care providers to develop a systematic approach for identifying newborns at risk for...

Groups cite more funding for RN programs as priority for New Year.(The Year Ahead)
January 23, 2006... Nurses once again will focus their attention on advocating for more federal funding to strengthen the nursing workforce, two nursing organizations told LNN. "Looking ahead in the new year, AACN [American Association of Colleges of Nursing]...

ANA urges congress to pass staffing bill, cites study to promote measure.
January 23, 2006... A study published in the January/February 2006 issue of the journal Health Affairs, which concludes that increasing the number of registered nurses and hours of nursing care per patient would save 6,700 lives and 4 million days of patient care...

RNs find food, drink consumption affects oral thermometer readings.(Research)
January 23, 2006... Nurses should make sure their patients have not had anything to eat or drink before taking their temperatures, according to recent research by nurses at the University of Virginia Health System. On average, study participants consuming cold...

Report card finds states' emergency systems woefully inadequate.
January 23, 2006... The state of emergency care in America received low marks in a report released recently by the American College of Emergency Physicians. The National Report Card on the State of Emergency Medicine finds an emergency care system...

NLN announces 85 percent pass rate for certified nurse educator exam.
January 23, 2006... The National League for Nursing has awarded the first designations as Certified Nurse Educator to academic nurse educators who successfully completed an examination administered by the NLN. "Through the certification program, we have raised...

Government releases findings from 2004 national sample survey of RNs.
January 23, 2006... The Health Resources and Services Administration recently released preliminary findings from the "2004 National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses." According to the latest data: * The registered nurse population grew by 7.9 percent...

Academic leaders form new alliance on nurse education to improve care.
January 23, 2006... The world will have an increased supply of highly educated nurses, if a new alliance of nursing education organizations is successful, Robert Rosseter, associate executive director of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, recently...

NCSBN says English proficiency standard should be higher for RNs.
January 23, 2006... State and federal policymakers should update the minimum score foreign-educated nurses must achieve on two federally recognized English language proficiency tests before they can work in the United States, the National Council of State Boards...

Information technology.
January 23, 2006... * The American Health Information Community Jan. 17 announced the formation of work groups to help it move toward implementation of specific projects in four areas within the next year. One group will work on reporting emergency department,...

Psychiatric hospitals.
January 23, 2006... * The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Jan. 13 announced a proposed 4.2 percent average update in Medicare payment rates for inpatient psychiatric facilities (IPF) for discharges on or after July 1 of rate year 2007. The proposed...

Antiviral medications.
January 23, 2006... * The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Jan. 14 advised clinicians not to prescribe two commonly used antiviral medications (amantadine and rimandatine) to treat or prevent flu this season, because most of the flu viruses circulating...

Free flu immunizations.
January 23, 2006... * The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations is accepting comments through Feb. 9 on a proposed accreditation standard that would require health care organizations to provide access to free flu immunizations at the work...

Electronic "continuity of care record".
January 23, 2006... * ASTM International, an organization that develops voluntary consensus standards for health care informatics and other fields, has released a standard specification for an electronic "continuity of care record," a core set of patient data that...

Patient safety.(Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to improve patient safety)(Brief Article)
January 23, 2006... * Joint Commission Resources has announced that it has received a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to develop a training series designed to help nurses and medical staff members improve patient safety through better communication....

Quality and disparities.
January 23, 2006... * Quality of health care for Americans has continued to improve at a modest pace, and health care disparities are narrowing overall for many minority Americans. But for Hispanics, disparities have widened in both quality of care and access to...

Medical errors.
January 23, 2006... * About 34,000 patients a year could be seriously or permanently injured or die during hospitalization because of medical errors and adverse events, according to results from a multi-year survey of reports from hospitals using electronic...

Campaign for Nursing's Future.
January 23, 2006... * Johnson & Johnson Jan. 5 received the Ron Brown Award for Corporate Leadership honoring its Campaign for Nursing's Future. The campaign was developed to help alleviate the nursing shortage by increasing awareness of the nursing profession and...

New roles at the AACN.(American Association of Colleges of Nursing)(Brief Article)
January 23, 2006... * The American Association of Colleges of Nursing recently announced that two staff members have assumed new roles at the AACN. Public Affairs Director Robert Rosseter is now the associate executive director with oversight responsibilities in...

Grant opportunities.
January 23, 2006... * As of Jan. 1, the Health Resources and Services Administration no longer accepts applications for grant opportunities in paper form. Applicants submitting new and competing continuations and a selected number of non-competing continuation...

California.(STATE NEWS)
January 23, 2006... * California: The nursing shortage may be less a shortage of nurses and more a shortage of good hospital managers, if the University of California at Los Angeles Medical Center is any indication. According to an article published recently in...

Florida.(Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida has donated $1.2 million to the universities)(Brief Article)
January 23, 2006... * Florida: Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida (BCBSF) has donated $1.2 million to the universities of North Florida and Florida to help address critical issues in nursing education, the Jacksonville Business Journal reported. Each university...

Maryland.(STATE NEWS)
January 23, 2006... * Maryland: The Maryland Health Services Cost Review Commission, the state agency charged with setting rates for Maryland Hospitals, in collaboration with the Maryland Higher Education Commission, has approved funding for a Nurse Support...

Ohio.(STATE NEWS)
January 23, 2006... * Ohio: The nursing shortage at Dayton-area hospitals is worse than the rest of the state or country, according to a study of the region's nurse supply. The study, conducted by the Nursing Institute of West Central Ohio, showed fewer...