The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
During Canadian Nursing Week, May 6-12, the Canadian Nurses Association will be celebrating nursing as a 'Leading Force for Change.' Nurses truly are leaders in the Canadian healthcare system. For patients, they are often the face of direct medical care in clinics, hospital wards, seniors' care facilities, emergency rooms, operation theatres, public health centres, and even in homes. Nurses are also administrators of healthcare programs and advocates for positive change and effective policies in healthcare. One of the biggest changes in the field of nursing over the last few years is the increase in accredited specialization, mainly seen in the rise of advanced practice registered nursing. In fact, the Globe and Mail reported in 2012 that the number of nursing practitioners had more than doubled in five years. APRNs typically receive post-graduate education and training in order to specialize as one of the following: nurse anesthetists; nurse midwives; clinical nurse specialists; and nurse practitioners. Another change that nurses are lobbying for is the establishment of nurse-led primary care facilities in remote or under-served areas. In such rural or urban core clinics, specialized RNs can independently provide patients with direct care. This is a way to provide assessment, interpretation of diagnostic materials, counselling, and teaching to people who would otherwise miss out on it. One thing is clear: to create more efficiency in our medical system, the more independence and interdependence our governments allow certified nursing practitioners, the better the system can respond to the needs of all patients in the primary care setting.
