The number of inpatient days for children admitted in national healthcare facilities has been on the rise since the year 2002. Statistics indicate that the increase has been as high as 50 percent. In addition, an increase of 55 percent in the number of emergency visits has been witnessed since the same year. This calls for a high level of preparedness among the Chief Nursing Officers.
Talley, Thorgrimson, and Robinson (2013) reiterate that the function of nursing preparedness should be fully steered by the Chief Nursing Officers. Will CNOs heed this call? Individual growth and success of a healthcare organization are only possible when nurse managers embrace, acquire and exercise executive skills when delivering care to patients.
In other words, executive skills should be mastered thoroughly by CNOs so that they can also be in a position to groom nurses under them. Besides, it is vital to point out that team development in nursing leadership remains part and parcel of the ethical responsibilities of Chief Nursing Officers. It is up to them to select and implement effective nursing leadership.
Attaining success can also be made possible when CNOs enhance exposure for nurses especially on financial data, safety measures, and the quality of healthcare delivery. The subordinate nurses can realize successful outcomes when they obtain the chance to read, translate and implement crucial nursing information.
Finally, the authors assert that all levels of nursing should be well furnished with relevant guidelines when it comes to the measurement, reporting, and translation of healthcare delivery procedures so that the desired health outcomes can be obtained. Such a pursuit for best practice can only be a reality when the Chief Nursing Officers heed to the call to perform their roles beyond reproach.
Ineffective communication has been blamed on myriads of errors encountered in clinical practice. There is a lot of existing evidence that demonstrates how most medical errors are occasioned by a lack of effective communication between nurses. Healthcare professionals ought to devise robust communication strategies.
Tschannen et al. (2011) attempt to scrutinize collaborative intervention as the main approach towards improving communing among nursing professionals. In particular, the authors think that nurse managers or Chief Nursing officers have a noble role to improve the overall communication patterns among all the professionals working under them. Most of the medical errors arise from poor
In this particular empirical study, openness towards communication appears to be the main strength of physicians. Physicians also tend to collaborate more readily when working in groups. Their levels of accuracy and transparency are above those of clinical nurses. Although collaboration between the two groups improved after a given time, nurses still scored below par compared to physicians.
From this quantitative study, there are calls for Chief Nursing Officers to develop viable communication plans between nurses and physicians. There is a need for CNOs to identify communication strategies that can work. As much as nursing professionals have background knowledge on effective communication strategies, the Chief Nursing Officers are in a vantage position to steer the rest of nursing professionals.
A collaborative working environment can indeed enhance communication. The current workplace culture in the nursing profession can hardly break the existing communication barriers. A team-centered culture is also crucial in enhancing a collaborative working environment among all nursing professionals.
References
Talley, L. B., Thorgrimson, D. H., & Robinson, N. C. (2013). Financial literacy as an essential element in nursing management practice. Nursing Economics, 31(2), 77-82.
Tschannen, D., Keenan, G., Aebersold, M., Kocan, M. J., Lundy, F., & Averhart, V. (2011). Implications of nurse-physician relations: Report of a successful intervention. Nursing Economics, 29(3), 127-135.