Conference Proceedings - School of Nursing & Midwifery - Trinity ...

School of Nursing & Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin: 8 th Annual Interdisciplinary Research Conference
Transforming Healthcare Through Research, Education & Technology: 7 th – 9 th November 2007
Conference Proceedings
patients who had seen a nurse as compared to those seen by a
doctor.
Conclusion
The introduction of nurse prescribing was successful across the
organisation because there was shared vision that directed the
operational infrastructures needed for the implementation of the
new roles. For example, an action learning set facilitated by the
Deputy Directors for the nurse prescribers meant that policies and
guidelines were developed iteratively to underpin their individual
and collective practices. Also, the ‘fit’ of the roles into existing team
structures helped to embed nurse prescribing within the study site.
For example, where teams had reviewed joint ways of working in
light of the need to manage increased caseloads. But, overall it was
the nurse prescribers themselves that were crucial to the success of
the implementation through their enthusiasm drive and desire to
succeed.
Contribution to new knowledge
The study was distinctive from others to date because it explored
the implementation of nurse prescribing roles within an acute care
setting from an organisational perspective. Also data were collected
from multiple levels including Executive Directors, clinical teams and
patients from both white and minority ethnic groups. Replication
studies within other acute hospital settings are now recommended
to extend collective understanding of the influences on the
implementation of new roles and to enable comparisons to be made
with the more established body of knowledge relating to nurse
prescribing in primary care (Luker et al 1997).
References
Healthcare Commission (2005) National survey programme
outpatients core questions version 4. Available at
www.nhssurveys.org/docs/Outpatient_2005_CoreQuestionnaire_V4.
pdf (accessed 31st July 2007).
Horne R, Weinman J, Hankins M (1999) The beliefs about medicines
questionnaire: the development and evaluation of a new method for
assessing the cognitive representation of medication. Psychology
and Health, 14, 1-24.
Horne R, Hankins M, Jenkins J (2001) Satisfaction with information
about medicines scale (SIMS). Quality in Health Care, 10, 135-140.
Latter S and Courtney M (2004) Effectiveness of nurse prescribing:
a review of the literature. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 13, 1, 26-32.
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