Exemplary Care: Registered Nurses and Licensed Practical Nurses Working Together

The Association of Registered Nurses of PEI, the Licensed Practical Nurses Association of PEI, and the PEI Health Sector Council today announced the release of Exemplary Care: Registered Nurses and Licensed Practical Nurses Working Together. This publication highlights the guiding principles shared among RNs and LPNs and clarifies some of the key differences between RNs and LPNs in clinical practice. The discussion and examples presented in the report reflect the practice of typical nurses and is intended to promote an understanding of:

• the scope of practice of each group,
• the practice expectations when both groups work together, and
• the contributions that both groups bring to the care setting.

Having a full understanding of the different health care contributions of RNs and LPNs will enhance and improve the process of collaboration and effective decision-making in the clinical setting.

RNs and LPNs are two health professions that work very closely together. This document represents an important milestone in fostering mutual knowledge-sharing and increased collaboration between the two professions to relieve some of the tremendous human resource pressures on the health system and create an exemplary health care workplace. A more efficient, collaborative nursing practice benefits all of us – nurses, other allied health professionals, and clients of the health system. An efficient, collaborative nursing practice enhances our ability to recruit and retain nurses and leads to better utilization of human resources and, consequently, savings in financial resources.

I hope you get a chance to read and comment on this document.

Cheers,
Mark

Best Practices in Interprofessional Care Case Study

This Health Council of Canada video presents a brief case study of a successful collaborative practice facility in Twillingate, a small community of about 2,500 people on the northeast shore of Newfoundland. The chronic disease care team described in the video exhibits qualities that I think we can consider best practices in collaborative care – namely, that collaborative care is a team-based approach where practitioners from different occupations and levels of the health system come together to discuss an individual client’s case. The approach is client-centred, includes the patient as a team-member, and promotes the sharing of knowledge between disciplines. Seems like a no-brainer, I know. That collaborative care is a somewhat revolutionary health care delivery model may be a revelation to some, but the degree of collaboration exhibited by the chronic disease team in Twillingate is not the norm. However, collaborative practice facilities and teams are becoming more prevalent. We have good examples on PEI which I will be profiling in future blog posts. Stay tuned!

Embedding of this video is disabled, so you'll have to link directly to Youtube to view it. Sorry about the extra step!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PADGp1I34is&feature=channel

A Family Health Team model

The article below describes a community’s response to pressures affecting its health human resources and its ability to deliver effective, quality health care. Many of the issues raised in the article are ones that we share in PEI – physician recruitment challenges, shifting demographics among the medical profession whereby more medical school graduates are choosing to specialize rather than enter family medicine, physician retirement, and so on.... Granted, there have been some good news stories, including some recent success recruiting physicians, but the times are changing and recruitment is just one piece of the puzzle.

The article outlines the development of an interprofessional, team-based health delivery system for the Peterborough region of Ontario, adhering to the ideals of collaborative, patient-centred care outlined in one of my previous blog posts. The Peterborough region currently has five interprofessional family health teams (two in the city of Peterborough), consisting of family doctors, nurse practitioners, receptionists (yes...they are an integral part of the health team concept), registered nurses, dietitians, social workers and so on. In 2008 the Peterborough Regional Health Centre was opened with the intention of expanding the interprofessional care concept to include outpatient services and bring specialist physicians into the mix.

It’s an interesting concept and one that appears to be working. Fourteen thousand people have been taken off the waiting list for a family doctor in the Peterborough region in the last two years and wait times have decreased. We have family health teams on PEI and I’m not sure how they compare to those in Peterborough, but the two jurisdictions are strikingly similar. Peterborough and Prince Edward Island are almost exactly equivalent in population (139,818 in PEI as of 2008 vs. 133,080 in Peterborough as of 2006). Both jurisdictions are also largely rural and comparable in overall area and population density (23.9 people per square kilometre in PEI vs. 35 per square kilometre in Peterborough).

I think it’s something that bears watching. If successful, some of the concepts that drive the Peterborough model might be worth adopting on PEI. For one thing, I’m curious to know how many people the Peterborough health teams count as patients compared to PEI teams. I’ll keep you posted if I find out. What are your thoughts?

The Perfect Storm

How a community calmed the rough waters of health care
By Gordon Gibb

You’ll have to forgive Dr. Don Harterre for choosing a winged warthog as his office mascot. The diminutive porker suspended above his desk serves as a delicious metaphor in view of recent success implementing family health teams in Peterborough, Ont., — something one local physician predicted would only happen "when pigs fly."

In Peterborough, an idyllic city of 75,000 located 90 minutes northeast of Toronto, health care is something people love to talk about these days.

Little wonder. The sprawling, state-of-the-art Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC) is slated to open in June, consolidating two outdated hospitals into one meticulously planned facility. The Peterborough Clinic has just moved into a new building adjacent to the PRHC, with its orphaned facility downtown tagged to house expanded vascular health services. Five family health teams are flourishing. And upwards of 14,000 people have come off the waiting list for a family doctor in the past two years.

read the rest of the article here...