Celebrate National Nurses Week, May 6-12
image from navy.mil
Nurses have helped build a healthy America and they deserve our thanks and admiration. From the time Florence Nightingale – “The Lady with the Lamp” – worked to improve the quality of care for patients, nurses have been practitioners of both an art and a science. The level of dedication to helping others must be sizable, the required knowledge base is considerable and the stamina to go on asks everything of a person.
Emergency rooms, private practices, clinics and shelters are the battleground on which staff nurses, nurse practitioners, nurse researchers and educators fight for patient safety. Funding to maintain proper resources has been difficult, more so during a recession than ever. There aren’t enough instant payday loans and installment loans to repay what nurses are worth. They deserve more than a Nurses’ Day 2009, so they got an entire week: National Nurses Week 2009.
Wednesday, May 6 is National Nurses’ Day
It begins then, and concludes on May 12, commemorating the birthday of the founder of modern nursing, Florence Nightingale. American Nurses Association (ANA) President Rebecca Patton
has created a press release that thanks nurses for all that they do and points toward this year’s theme, “Nurses: Building a Healthy America.” She recognizes that through disaster and crisis, today’s nurses must continue to move forward in compassion and build on their nursing education.
At 2.9 million strong, nurses are the largest group of health care workers in the United States, and Patton encourages them all to join the campaign to work for “much-needed reform” in patient care. The week-long celebration is a reminder of both the continuing mission and the need to celebrate how far the profession has come. Patients, their families and the rest of society have benefited from these sterling caregivers.
Rallying to face the challenges
The following are critical areas which Patton feels the ANA and the rest of America’s health care field should refocus their efforts. Working closely with President Obama and his administration, it is my hope (as someone who has depended upon the skill and initiative of nurses during the challenges that came with the birth of my children) that the greater good will be addressed through these issues:
- Establishing staffing levels that promote a safe and healthy working environment for nurses and to ensure the highest possible patient care. To support safe staffing, ANA has launched a national campaign to help fight for safe staffing legislation. To find out more about what you can do to advance safe staffing, please visit www.safestaffingsaveslives.org. This Web site serves as a one-stop source of helpful information with user-friendly tools. On the site, you will be able to find ANA’s “Principles on Safe Staffing,” background research on safe staffing, federal and state legislation and ANA’s legislative and legal action
- ANA favors a restructured health care system that does the following: Enhances consumer access to services by delivering primary health care in community-based settings; Fosters consumer responsibility for personal health, self care, and informed decision making in selecting health care services; Facilitates utilization of the most cost-effective providers and therapeutic options in the most appropriate settings
- The American Nurses Association (ANA) announced its endorsement of President Barack Obama and looks forward to working with the new administration and new lawmakers to affect positive change for nurses and the patients we serve. President Obama believes, as ANA does, that health care is a basic human right, not a privilege. ANA is ready to work with the new administration to provide safe, affordable quality health care for all
- Increasing interest and support for addressing educational preparation for the RN workforce. Evidence shows that higher levels of nursing education are linked with lower patient mortality rates, fewer errors and greater job satisfaction among RNs
The politics of restructuring the American health care system will make achieving all of these aims a great challenge. Determination will be required. Take stock on Nurses’ Week of what the nursing profession has done for you or someone you love. Without the aid of nurses, my wife could have died during our first pregnancy. I know they helped me maintain my composure during those difficult times, too. I am eternally thankful for what caring nurses can accomplish. Are you?
Related Video:
After listening to the Commentator and host of NPR on the radio the other day, I couldn’t help but crack up with laughter. As he interviewed a nursing VP from the hospital I currently work in and a nurse educator Director from a local college and a few other prominent women from the area in the field of nursing. His first hand views of what nurses’ are responsible for based on his own hospital experiences , the stress of the job, and the lack of income that has not appreciated with the responsibility and short staffing issues really hit the nail on the head. He stated, “I’ve been in the hospital and I know what nurses’ are responsible for, I understand why there is a nursing shortage and will continue to be one!”, all the while his promininent guests attempted to idealize what the ideals of nursing were, he told them the way it is. I couldn’t help but, Cheer, as I drove home after having a rough night, having worked a 13.75 hour shift, taking care of kids who had various issues throughout the night. I have come to dread going to work, as I am tired of being tired all the time. Where you are the catchall for all the seems to go wrong. If dietary or housekeeping doesn’t do their job then you followup, if the doctor doesn’t do his job then you followup or you initiate, and of course do your job to, and let’s not even get into the psycho social issues that you deal with. Less than 1% of the people we deal with would I consider normal or have common sense. Athletes make hundreds and thousands more than we do with commercial deals and the like, yet we are only responsible for you and your loved ones lives. We are the guardians at the gate, our assessments and emergency care can decide whether you live or die, or how well you recover. I have been a nurse for 12 years, it has not been a picnic in any way shape or form. I am done, but I am still young, because of the lack of respect and financial reward I have decided to move on. Before going into nursing I acquired a number of credits toward a degree in Chemistry. We will collaborate all of the credits and skills I’ve obtained and move on. I’ve updated my resume and will seek other interests like the pharmeceutical and biotech industry. Nurses deserve better.
What a great week! Thanks to you and all nurses for the dedication you put into nursing. All our thanks would only be a small tribute to nurses that deserve so much more.
Nurses are the backbone of the medical field, and they do a lot of the heavy lifting. They definitely deserve a lot more credit than they get.