Timely care is a strong factor in patient contentment while waiting duration is the biggest factor contributed to patient contentment. At major Emergency Medicine (EM) conferences, it has become a heated debate especially those hosted each year by Society for Academic Emergency Medicine and the American College of Emergency Physicians (Derlet and Richards, 2008)
The staff members and ED doctors while diagnosing and evaluating ED patients are sidetracked by the requirement of more patient's accommodation. The admitted patients are given inpatient services; apart from that they also need back end care from ED personnel (Ganapathy and Zwemer, 2003)
Various hospitals and medical centers employ NPs in primary health care and of late they have been incorporated into the EDs, too. The studies and text evaluating the execution of the NP function has exhibited many positivities including: reduction in waiting times, economic and affordable health services and most important, improvement in patient satisfaction, all resulting in better health results for patients (Jennings et al
A heated discussion persists regarding what entails and measures patient satisfaction. Latest research agrees with the fact that improved health should be the final goal in mind (Laschinger, Almost, and Tuer-Hodes, 2003), compliance based on recommendations; focus on medical treatment and punctual keeping of appointments (Moore, Saywell, Thakker, and Jones, 2002; Williams, 1994), less usage of healthcare resources and avoid legal proceedings (Bowers, Swan, and Koehler, 1994; Thompson, Yarnold, Adams, and Spacone, 1996)
The proper segregation and classification of patients needing urgent and Ed attention need to be screened out to reduce the stress on the heavily burdened ED. This practice is being increasingly adopted by more hospitals of late (McGee and Kaplan, 2007)
According to Institute of Medicine (IOM) six aspects of quality care are: Timeliness Patient centeredness Efficiency Equity Effectiveness Safety All of these factors are compromised when patients stands for long durations for their doctor's appointment, ED is boarded by patients and when ambulances aren't patient-hospital proximity centered. During the recent researches, most have shown that ED crowding is a huge factor in poor patient quality care (McHugh et al
A heated discussion persists regarding what entails and measures patient satisfaction. Latest research agrees with the fact that improved health should be the final goal in mind (Laschinger, Almost, and Tuer-Hodes, 2003), compliance based on recommendations; focus on medical treatment and punctual keeping of appointments (Moore, Saywell, Thakker, and Jones, 2002; Williams, 1994), less usage of healthcare resources and avoid legal proceedings (Bowers, Swan, and Koehler, 1994; Thompson, Yarnold, Adams, and Spacone, 1996)
Currently, more than 9/10ths of hospitals are complaining of ED crowding as a major problem. A basic worry is the possibility for ED crowding to inversely affect quality of care and of use to patients admitted in the ED (Pines et al
Currently, more than 9/10ths of hospitals are complaining of ED crowding as a major problem. A basic worry is the possibility for ED crowding to inversely affect quality of care and of use to patients admitted in the ED (Pines et al
In recent times, nurse practitioners are being targeted for primary care environment. Considerable research has been done in case of nurse practitioners for emergency and accidents (A and E) and minor injury settings (Sakr et al
On the other hand, since ED staff have to accord highest preference to cases of urgent nature, those seeking routine and non-critical care are bound to wait for a long duration of time and possibly low quality of care. So as to address this rising concern, EDs in the United States as well as more recently in the UK along with Canada have incorporated nurse practitioners (NPs) to deal with patients who exhibit and hence deserve non-urgent as well as primary healthcare requirements (Thrasher and Purc-Stephenson, 2008)
FNP's are not just primary care givers as it was in previous years but their roles have evolved to include the treatment of both physical and psychological situations, which is done through conducting: physical exams, ordering and interpreting diagnostic tests and comprehensive history taking. It is worth noting that the FNP's are educated, certified and accredited nationally in areas of: Pediatrics- under pediatrics they can serve in pediatric critical health care, acute care, pediatric oncology and general pediatrics (PNP), gerontology (GNP), acute care (ACNP), adult health (ANP), neonatology (NNP) (Codina, 2007)
Institutions that work collaboratively with this role include; Anesthesiologist Association of America, Medical Boards of the individual states where this role is practiced, American Association of nurse Anesthesiologists, Department of health, Accreditation agencies. These institutions play complementary roles to the effect that they offer assessment of the nurse's competency in discharging their duties as anesthesiologist as well as providing supervisory protocols between the CRNAs and the anesthesiologist (Horton, 2010)
As established in subsequent sections of this paper, the CRNA's are under the hospitals chain of command and authority. However, there is distinction between regular nurses and the ANP's, hospitals should have their chief matron as an APN, since this position requires the head to be firstly a general practice nurse (Masters, 2009)
However the core principles that define the characteristics of APNs as a professional nurse whom; integrates research and research tools in the discharge of their responsibilities all the while maintaining a high degree of professional autonomy and independent practice. An APN is also characterized as an individual who has advanced health assessment expertise, which incorporate skills in diagnostics (Hamric, Spross & Hanson, 2008)
Conducting patient satisfaction surveys on the individuals who were served by NA's would lead to specific responses of before surgery and after surgery care, and would give an indication on the NA's client service, and not just the medical perspective of administering the drugs. In conclusion, the role of NA has its standing validated by historical facts as well as legitimate accreditation by agencies that give credence to the theory leant in school combined with clinical experience (Duncan & DePew, 2011)
Under section 301.002 sub-sections 2 defines professional nursing as: "The show of an act that needs significant particular judgment and skill, the appropriate conduct associated with knowledge of biological, physical, and social science as acquired by a fulfilled course in an accepted school of professional nursing" (Brixey, 2008)
The authors conclude with the thought that when there is more clarity around the roles of NPs, a solution for the continuing problem of too few physicians can easily be found in the person of qualified, competent nurse practitioners. What is the current level of autonomy among NPs? How independent are nurse practitioners? It is well-known that NPs desire and deserve autonomy -- which gives NPs "substantial control over [their] professional practice" (Bahadori, et al
The research involved in-depth interviews with 15 nurse practitioners in both countries; it also involved scrutinizing available published scholarship in journals, examining nurse practitioner program curricula in universities, and reviewing policy documents that were germane to this issue. Since the nurse practitioner position is a relatively new one in these two countries, the authors felt that by developing "…a clearly articulated" and empirically informed "description of the core role of the nurse practitioner," they could provide the basis for new and updated "educational and practice competency standards" (Carryer, et al
The value of advanced practice nursing roles in healthcare This article in the Journal of Advanced Nursing points to the need for a greater understanding of the role that nurse practitioners play in the healthcare milieu. The authors agree that the role of the advanced practice nurse (also known as nurse practitioners) has been increasing on an international level, there are nonetheless "inconsistencies" around the definition of the roles played, around the educational standards and credentialing requirements established for NPs (Lowe, et al