March 2016 Vol. 11 No. 3

A stubborn case of supraventricular tachycardia

JAKE KARCHNER, age 65, is admitted for treatment of acute myeloid leukemia. Because of his history of supraventricular tachycardia (SVT), the physician has ordered telemetry monitoring. When you…
Metrics

Acute care needed: The call for valid acuity systems

ALTHOUGH HEALTH CARE has been changing rapidly, staffing models have stayed essentially the same for decades. Those models rely solely on financial and patient-volume metrics to drive operational decisions related to nurse…

Breathing life back into a medical ethics committee

Organizations pursuing Magnet® recognition must ensure the evidence supports the structures in place for frontline nurses to address ethical issues. What’s more, the organization’s nurses need to have a strong understanding of…

Caring for patients with lumbar drains

A LUMBAR DRAIN is a small, flexible tube placed in the arachnoid space to drain cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). Indications for lumbar drains include: to drain CSF leakage secondary to a…

FDA expands use of Xalkori

On March 11, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Xalkori (crizotinib) to treat people with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumors have an ROS-1 gene…

Gaining confidence in public speaking

EVA, a professional practice coordinator, and her team of clinical educators are thrilled to learn that their abstract on an iLead in Nursing initiative (Innovation in LEadership and ADministration in Nursing and…

How to succeed at floating

If you’ve ever floated,  you know the experience can be challenging at times. Wherever you work, you may sometimes feel you don’t have enough hours in the day to complete all your…

How you can avoid laboratory errors

YOU MIGHT be wondering: Since when do nurses make laboratory errors? Actually, we make them fairly often—typically by using improper technique when collecting and handling samples and specimens. Preanalytic errors (those occurring before the sample…

Let’s take the lead in educating the public about nursing

Editor’s note: The authors are the executive director and senior advisor, respectively, of The Truth About Nursing, a nonprofit organization that seeks to increase public understanding of nurses’ role in health care…
Nurse fatigue

Let’s work together to solve long hours and nurse fatigue

NURSE FATIGUE may seem inevitable in many healthcare environments, with a portion of registered nurses (RNs) consistently working past their normal shifts—jeopardizing their own health and potentially crossing the line between safe…

Nurses can help improve outcomes in severe sepsis

The body’s systemic response to an infection, sepsis can progress to severe sepsis and, in some cases, to septic shock. More than 1 million Americans suffer from severe sepsis annually. This number may grow in the…
policy development

Power for positive change

ONE OF THE GREATEST THREATS to nursing is not being involved in decisions about policies affecting the profession and patients. Advocacy is a cornerstone of nursing; yet a 2011 poll of…

Program reduces bullying in preschool children

Early Childhood Friendship Project, an eight-week program, reduced bullying behaviors in preschool children, according to a study in School Psychology Review. Read more
work place safety

Slips, trips, and falls: Not just for patients

REGISTERED NURSES (RNs) are diligent in assessing a patient’s risk for falls and implementing proper fall prevention protocol and policies. But did you know that slips, trips, and falls (STF) are…

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