Welcome to the College of Nurses Aotearoa News Update.
No. 390, Wednesday 28 March 2018
NATIONAL NEWS
Redeveloped Māori nursing degree helps workforce
Among the 200 graduates receiving degrees from Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi, nineteen were beneficiaries of a redeveloped Māori nursing degree, designed to help bring more Māori nurses into the workforce.
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Huntington leading School of Nursing
One of New Zealand’s most experienced nurse academics has been appointed as the acting head of Massey University’s School of Nursing.
Professor Annette Huntington, who led the nursing programmes from 2008 - 2016 first as director of nursing and then as head of school, has stepped into the interim role, while a search is conducted for a new head.
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Medal for Levin nurse
Levin nurse Gail Corbett is one of three New Zealand nurses who received the Florence Nightingale Medal, the highest international nursing award, from Governor General Dame Patsy Reddy on Tuesday night at Government House in Wellington.
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The unhealthy pressure on our health system
With ever-tightening purse strings and increasing demands on the public health system, cracks are beginning to show across the country. Deena Coster takes a look at what it means in Taranaki.
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Nurses advancing the health of the nation
Me haeretahi tātou mō te hauora me te orange o ngā iwi katoa o Aotearoa: Let us journey together for the health and well-being of the people of Aotearoa.
NZNO tonight launches its Strategy for Nursing 2018-2023 at Travelodge Wellington. NZNO chief executive Memo Musa, president Grant Brookes and kaiwhakahaere Kerri Nuku are launching it to nurse leaders from around New Zealand.
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Nurses and midwives vote no to 2% pay rise deal
Thousands of public hospital nurses are likely to go on strike after voting to reject a new pay deal.
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Video: PM urges DHB's take advice on floundering nurse pay dispute from independent panel
Jacinda Ardern says an independent body could "unlock the impasse” over the nurses union’s rejection of two per cent pay rise from DHB's.
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DHBs look for middle ground in nurses pay and workload claim
District Health Boards are working on ways to address nurses’ concerns about their pay and their conditions of work.DHB spokesperson, Dr Ashley Bloomfield, says nurses are critical to providing health services and DHBs are very aware of the pressure many are feeling in their day-to-day work.
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Woodhouse named National's health spokesman following Coleman's departure
Michael Woodhouse will take over from departing National MP Jonathan Coleman as the party's health spokesman.
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Health minister pours water on public-private partnership offer for elective surgeries
They have the beds, they have the staff, and they have the hospitals: the Private Hospitals Association believes it holds the solution to the ever-growing list of Kiwis awaiting elective surgery.
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AGED CARE
Elderly woman's death from infected bedsores: Rest home found in breach of health code
A rest home has been found in breach of the health code after an elderly woman died of an infection resulting from bedsores.
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Long Read: Our rest home shame
Rest home residents are dying from bed sores. Nicholas Jones finds the preventable tragedies reflect wider problems in a sector trusted with our most vulnerable.
Rosalie Cunningham played golf through her 70s but dementia stopped that and other more mundane activities.
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Government needs to step up on staffing ratios, says rest homes expert
A major investigation by the Weekend Herald has revealed dire living situations in many rest homes across the country.
Consumer New Zealand's Jessica Wilson has spent a decade researching care in rest homes and told Newstalk ZB the Government needs to step up and improve legislation to ensure a much higher standard for the vulnerable elderly.
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CANCER ISSUES
Terms of reference for Bowel Screening Programme review released
The Terms of Reference for an Independent Assurance Review for the National Bowel Screening Programme has been released today.
The Minister of Health is seeking assurance through an independent review about how well positioned the NBSP is for successful delivery, what changes might be required and what the Ministry of Health can learn to support the design and roll out of further national initiatives.
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DHBs
Hospital rot: Health Minister has frank words for DHB
The extent of the leaky and rotting buildings at Middlemore Hospital was not revealed to the current or former Health Ministers.
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SSC investigation finds Waikato health boss Nigel Murray, DHB wanting
Nigel Murray had already been ousted from a top health job in Canada because of concerns over his management and leadership skills when Waikato DHB was looking to hire him as its new chief executive.
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MERGENCY MEDICINE AND SERVICES
111 Clinical Hub now reducing hospital presentations New Zealand wide
Improvements to the St John 111 ambulance call system are now fully embedded throughout New Zealand, having been rolled out in the remaining South Island DHB areas at the end of last year.
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Elderly patients sent packing in the middle of the night from overloaded ED
An elderly Christchurch woman says she felt bullied by an emergency department (ED) nurse to pick her husband up at 3am.
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END OF LIFE CARE
Hospice may have to charge users
The head of the Nelson-Tasman Hospice says charging users for the service is something it may have to consider in the future.
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HEART DISEASE
Fewer Pacific and Maori babies survive with heart condition - research
New research shows the survival rates of babies with a rare but potentially fatal heart defect is lower for Pacific and MÄ?ori compared to European babies.
Researchers say it is another example of inequity in health outcomes that raises the question of whether methods of healthcare provision contribute to these different outcomes.
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MENTAL HEALTH
Māori narratives an alternative to western mental health system
Patients at Te Kūwatawata clinic are told stories about Māori gods or atua, re-connected to their whakapapa and facilitated through wānanga before they're offered traditional medicine.
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More adults diagnosed with mood disorders, statistics reveal
More New Zealand adults are being diagnosed with anxiety, depression and bipolar.
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Strong demand for new suicide prevention courses
A new group of courses helping people initiate discussions around suicide rather than waiting until someone has died before intervening are experiencing overwhelming demand.
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OBESITY / SUGAR TAX
Study shows 'four-fold increase in obesity in one generation'
Early predictors of adult obesity in New Zealand include being born a male, being raised in a single parent family, and experiencing severe sexual abuse, a study has found.
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District health boards funding more weight loss surgeries than Ministry of Health
New Zealand has a significant obesity problem and Auckland's district health boards are feeling the financial pressure to fund extra weight-loss surgeries.
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Dietary counselling – how effective and cost-effective is it?
In this blog we consider recent literature (particularly reviews) on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of dietary counselling as a health intervention. Most studies suggest that dietary counselling is effective though the benefits are typically modest and short-term. The literature on cost-effectiveness is mixed, and there is substantial uncertainty about long-run cost-effectiveness given the typically short-term trials involved. Addressing the obesogenic environment will have potentially (much) larger gains, and due to substantial reductions in obesity-related disease it is likely to be cost-saving. However, governments, policy-makers and the public are often interested in counselling interventions, necessitating close attention to cost-effectiveness of these interventions relative to more structural changes to the environment.
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'Health rationing' possible in the face of looming diabetes rates
How will we pay for the continuing growth in the number of people with diabetes? With the revenue from a sugar tax? Rachel Thomas reports in part three of Stuff's Sugar Fix series.
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STROKE
FAST stroke campaign makes a difference
The number of people who could correctly identify two key signs of a stroke increased following a Ministry of Health funded public awareness campaign.
The Clinical Leader Stroke, Associate Professor Anna Ranta says the 2017 Face, Arm, Speech and Time (FAST) campaign focused on educating people to spot the signs of a stroke and get help quickly.
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TELEHEALTH AND E-HEALTH
Robots helped patients’ with drug and exercise routines
A pilot randomised controlled trial using robots to help people at home with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease has found that the robots helped patients take their medication, carry out exercises, and keep them company.
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What is known about the effectiveness of social sector freephone helplines?
“Telephone helpline services commonly consist of a mix of telephone and web-based services that allow a person to receive prompt advice, triage care and referral via telephone or over the internet. These types of services are well-established in the health and social sectors. This literature review focuses on the effectiveness of freephone helplines and associated digital services within the social sector.” Source: Social Policy Evaluation and Research Unit (New Zealand)
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INTERNATIONAL NEWS
NURSES CALL FOR MORE NURSING INSTRUCTORS IN FACE OF SHORTAGE
MEDFORD, Ore. -- Nurses say there's a shortage of nursing instructors. And they add that it's contributing to the nationwide nursing shortage.
Debbie Hogenson is a charge nurse at the ICU at Providence Medford Medical Center. She says there is abundance of students applying to nursing programs, but they're turned away because there aren't enough instructors.
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Nurse and midwife misconduct hearings may be held in secret
Nurses and midwives will rarely be subject to public misconduct hearings and could avoid any sanctions for errors if they admit blunders early, under controversial new plans.
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Advance-practice nurses could soon bring care to rural S.C.
Advance-practice nurses in South Carolina are optimistic that a bill introduced more than a year ago to expand their scope of practice will become law by the end of this legislative session.
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Australian nursing and midwifery code of conduct slammed over ‘white privilege’
LAST year nurses were asked to call women “persons”. Now there’s another furore as they’re told to acknowledge “white privilege”.
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Number of nurse practitioners in US hits record high
The number of nurse practitioners in the U.S. reached an all-time high March 20, with more than 248,000 NPs currently licensed to practice across the country, according to data released by the American Association of Nurse Practitioners.
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WORKPLACE
It’s Not You, It’s Your Body Language
Are your instinctive gestures while communicating betraying your message?The only way to answer that question is by practicing self-awareness. Self-awareness is by no means a new concept, but it can be something you turn a blind eye to unknowingly amid everyday life. And if you’re like most people, you likely do not regularly ask for feedback from others regarding your body language.
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ARTICLES OF INTEREST
Call to action: How to implement evidence-based nursing practice
Nursing2018April 2017, Volume 47 Number 4 , p 36 - 43
EVERY DAY in their practice settings, nurses encounter questions, problems, and patient needs that require effective clinical decision making for appropriate intervention. To address these situations, nurses have historically applied knowledge and skills acquired from various mechanisms, including healthcare instruction, ritual and tradition, and personal choice.1
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Reviving the Journal Club as a Nursing Professional Development Strategy
Journal for Nurses in Professional Development
March/April 2016, Volume :32 Number 2 , page 104 - 106
Journal Clubs have long been used with great success in medical education. They were instituted in the early 1800s in England where a group of students met regularly in a room over a baker's shop to read journals or play cards. In Montreal in 1875, Osler, considered one of the fathers of modern medicine who established the medical residency program, developed a Journal Club for medical residents to share articles, because the journals were too expensive for individual purchase. They met at dinner to review and discuss the latest medical research. By 1900, Journal Clubs were a routine part of medical education.
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The above information has been collated for the College of Nurses Aotearoa (NZ) Inc by Linda Stopforth, SNIPS and is provided on a weekly basis. It is current as at Tuesday 20 March 2018
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