Voice of the People - Chronicle Herald (May 12, 2023)
The theme for this year’s National Nursing Week is Our Nurses Our Future, and how appropriate as we highlight key roles and leadership that nurses hold in health care and its future.
Nurses are ingrained in our health system and are at the foundation of how we deliver care. As clinicians, advocates, educators, researchers, leaders and scholars, nurses lead and support care across the health system, from community-based care, primary health care, public health, home care and long-term care to our acute-care units.
Learning from the pandemic, when nurses were at the forefront of care delivery and rapid deployment of innovations, the future of our health care, including strengthening of our workforce, will continue to leverage the expertise and experience of our nurses.
Being at the forefront of key transformations and innovative movements, and as a leader in strengthening the global nursing workforce, Nova Scotia is taking a lifecycle approach in strengthening our nursing workforce.
Nova Scotia’s early immersion program is for nursing students so we can bring them into our system sooner in enhanced learning and training environments. We have summer opportunities for nursing students. The transition to practice and virtual mentorship programs support new graduates and new nurses to the province through ongoing supervision and mentorship.
We continue to implement initiatives to enhance professional development, incentives and wellness programs for nurses, including leveraging expertise of retired nurses through our mentorship program. The just-in-time program provides enhanced clinical support for after-hours care and specialized programs through simulation learning, telemonitoring and virtual point-of-care tools for clinical decision making.
Nurses are at the forefront of planning and leading the “test and try” of innovative models of care such as VirtualCareNS, mobile primary care clinics, RN prescribers initiative, optimized models of care in primary care settings and innovations in community-based models like pharmacies. We also established strategic partnerships with leading nursing schools around the world to strengthen the nursing workforce.
As we celebrate National Nursing Week, I urge you to thank nurses and to reflect on the many invaluable contributions they bring to patients and families, our communities and our health-care system.
Dr. Gail Tomblin Murphy, vice-president, research, innovation and discovery, and chief nurse executive with Nova Scotia Health
