Nursing has been swept into the Age of Computers with “informatics” as the transforming medium. The data we are able to collect, and what we have learned from it, have given us more respect and authority than we had with all our book knowledge, experience, and intuitive powers.
At the same time, there has been a renewed emphasis on caring — really caring — for patients. Miraculously, another side of the computer revolution — Internet communication — has given us the capability to “be there” for people with our expertise no matter when they need it. And we can turn to the World Wide Web for an array of new tools for caring.
Congress Looks at National Nurse
Teri Mills, RN, MS, ANP, has a dream. The RN who teaches at Portland Community College in Oregon, is the sparkplug for the National Nurse campaign. So far, she has managed to inspire legislation to establish a cabinet-level nursing position.
It began with Teri’s op ed piece in the
New York Times. Last May she argued:
Our nation has an excellent “sick care” system, but has not done much to lower costs. The focus should be on prevention. Part of the problem is that advice comes flying at us from many directions, but is not readily available when we need it most.
Everybody knows nurses are patient educators – when they send a new mother and her baby home from the hospital, and up to counseling family members when a loved one is dying. They are consistently named among our most trusted professionals, according to Gallup polls.
So why not appoint a nurse to a high visibility position — like the Surgeon General — to communicate and help address national health care concerns? The strategies, carried out by volunteers, could include weekly radio talks by experts, community campaigns, disaster teams licensed to go anywhere, and a multi-lingual website for all citizens to get up-to-date health information.
Teri’s essay caught the attention of Rep. Earl Blumenauer who entered it into the Congressional Record. It so happens the three RNs in Congress, including Lois Capps from California, have organized a bipartisan Nursing Caucus that now has over 50 members. Capps is writing the National Nurse bill.
Mills says she has received many supporting emails from health professionals, not just from nurses, but also pharmacists and physicians. Critics say it would be a costly duplication. Mills acknowledges that nurses around the country are doing “some of what we want to do,” but she insists it should be taken to a national level.
"With National Nurse, we’ll all be on the same page at the same time," She contends.
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