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At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2006

Social capital, rural nursing and rural nursing theory.

The notion of social capital focuses attention on social connectedness within communities and the ways that this connectedness may affect health and well-being. There are many competing definitions of social capital but most suggest that it involves trust, social networks and reciprocity within communities, not necessarily geographically defined. The usefulness of social capital and related theories that help in understanding the function of nurses in rural communities are explored in this paper. Nurses and health service planners are becoming increasingly aware of the potential contribution of community nurses in rural and/or remote areas, as evidenced in the development of nurse practitioners. Through their interrelational role and status in rural communities, nurses are often 'immersed' or 'embedded' in the social networks that make up the fabric of rural life and may therefore be important contributors to social capital. For a concept such as social capital to be useful in nursing research, it must have distinct attributes, delineated boundaries, and well-described preconditions and outcomes in multiple contexts.

Communication↗
PubMed1993

The uniqueness of rural nursing.

Rural nursing is a unique and challenging field of nursing that requires a "special breed" of nurse that is committed to high quality, comprehensive care at the individual, family, and community levels. The unique characteristics of rural nursing include close interaction with the community, a truly generalist approach, and increased autonomy, cohesiveness, and community visibility. This area of specialty practice requires nurses to be highly competent and well-prepared in all aspects of professional practice. Certainly, the demands of rural nursing are great, as are the benefits. Rural nursing can indeed be the essence of what nursing should be.

Community Health Nursing↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Preceptorships in high-risk perinatal nursing for rural nurses: a pilot project.

A need existed in New Mexico to enhance the skills of nurses in rural areas in the management of high-risk perinatal patients. However, barriers prohibited initiating such a program, including: a) program development and approval; b) legal and insurance issues; c) determining financial responsibility; and d) application and selection process. Resolving these problems came in the form of a collaborative effort among three departments at the University of New Mexico. A preceptor program of clinical and classroom experiences was developed for nurses outside of the Albuquerque metropolitan area. Evaluations of the program at six months revealed that program participants had implemented changes in their nursing practice. Revisions of the program and plans for the future are discussed.

Clinical Competence↗
PubMed2005

Work stress and physical assault of nursing aides in rural nursing homes with and without dementia special care units.

PURPOSE: This study compared nursing aides (NAs) employed in rural nursing homes with and without dementia special care units (SCUs) on (1) exposure to and distress from disruptive behaviours exhibited by residents, (2) job strain and (3) physical assault. DESIGN AND METHODS: The data were drawn from a larger study conducted in Saskatchewan, Canada, in which all rural nursing homes of < or = 100 beds that had an SCU were matched to same-sized rural facilities with no SCU. Nursing aides (n = 355) completed a mailed survey questionnaire. RESULTS: Nursing aides employed in nursing homes with an SCU reported significantly less frequent exposure to disruptive behaviours (including aggressive and aversive behaviours) than NAs in non-SCU facilities, less distress when these behaviours were directed toward them, less exposure to aggressive behaviour during caregiving, lower job demands and lower job strain. There was a trend toward increased risk of being assaulted in the last year associated with being in a non-SCU facility. Having a permanent position, increased job strain, and feeling inadequately prepared for dementia care were significantly associated with higher risk of being assaulted. In the SCU facilities, NAs who worked more time on the SCU reported more assaults but less distress from disruptive behaviour, lower psychological job demands, lower job strain and greater work autonomy. IMPLICATIONS: Providing more dementia care training and reducing job demands and job strain may help to reduce work-related stress and physical assault of nursing aides employed in nursing homes.

Adult↗
PubMed2003

Educating for rural nursing practice.

BACKGROUND: Rural hospitals in Australia, as in many countries, face challenges in ensuring that appropriate, quality services are provided. AIMS: The overall aim of this study was to explore the issues that impact on the ability of rural hospitals to provide effective health care. METHODS: We used a qualitative descriptive method and purposive sampling, and conducted interviews in hospitals in rural Victoria, Australia. The data collected enabled major issues that impact on hospital service delivery to be identified. Using thematic analysis, global themes were extracted and organized around a thematic network. FINDINGS: The workforce was an important theme. Whilst the impact of medical shortages on hospital function has been considered in other studies, little consideration has been given to the rural nursing workforce. The need to maintain an appropriately educated rural nursing workforce emerged as one of the major issues that impact on rural hospital service delivery. In Australia, there has been a great deal of discussion about the educational preparation required for rural nursing practice, with the emphasis on postgraduate study. However, the majority of rural nurses do not have postgraduate qualifications and face significant barriers in obtaining them. Although the vast majority of literature claims that postgraduate preparation is vital for rural nursing practice, this research suggests that the future rural nursing workforce will be recruited from undergraduate courses in regional universities. However, there is a need to include specific theoretical and operational preparation in undergraduate education, to enable nurses to make the transition to rural practice more readily. CONCLUSIONS: Rural nurses are central to the delivery of health services in rural hospitals. Future rural nursing recruitment and retention hinges on ensuring that they have the confidence, knowledge and skills to deliver safe, appropriate and effective care.

Curriculum↗
PubMed1997

Working together: the advanced rural nurse practitioner and the rural doctor.

This paper discusses the complex and interrelated roles of the rural nurse and doctor. These roles are viewed as being complementary to each other in any healthcare setting, but more so within the context of rural Australia. The current move towards the development of advanced nurse practitioner roles is often clouded by unnecessary medical fears that nurses are attempting to displace doctors. In contrast, this paper argues that the development of new rural nursing roles identifies rural nursing as a major specialist area within the wider profession of nursing and, at the same time, recognises the reality of practice for many rural nurses. Individual public figures may perceive the solution to the shortage of rural doctors to lie in their replacement with nurses. The nursing profession, however, will resist this approach. Nursing is not the first rung on the ladder to a career in medicine. Nurses are educated and acknowledged to focus their practice on the clients' responses to healthcare problems and not the practice of medicine. The primary role of the nurse is to provide care. The primacy of care should not be set aside by those nurses seeking to develop their practice, not should advanced practice be defined in terms of taking on tasks previously carried out by other healthcare professionals.

Australia↗
PubMed2004

Maximizing the involvement of rural nurses in policy.

Rural health issues are increasingly recognized as needing attention, but many health policies in Canada are developed for the urban context and universally applied to rural settings. Addressing rural nurses' opportunities for involvement in policy will contribute to our general understanding of rural health while improving community health services. Rural nurses are in a unique position to assist because of their intimate knowledge of their communities and their position as informal community leaders. Challenges to their involvement include decreased numbers and lack of educational preparation about policy. A strength is the higher percentage of rural nurses who are managers compared to their urban counterparts. Nursing education programs need to include theoretical content and practical opportunities related to health policy. Managers need to support rural nurses' attempts in policy development by providing opportunities for membership on policy committees. Finally, once obtaining skills in the policy arena, rural nurses need to work within their communities and workplaces to help develop and implement more appropriate rural-based policies.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed1997

Extended, expanded, multi-skilled or advanced practice?--rural nurses in Australia, 1991-1994.

Rural nurses in Australia predominantly work in an advanced practice role and their scope of practice is determined by the number and type of health professionals who work full-time or part-time in the health service. This paper presents the results of a discourse analysis, using Foucault's framework, of rural nurses in Australia, 1991-1994. It argues that the use of the statements 'extended nursing practice', 'expanded nursing practice', and 'multi-skilled nurses' continues to subjugate rural nursing practice to more dominant discourses such as medicine, pharmacy and radiography. It proposes the term advanced rural nursing practice be used to refer to the generalist scope of nursing practice in rural areas.

Australia↗
PubMed2005

The strength of rural nursing: implications for undergraduate nursing education.

Nursing in rural communities offers opportunities for independent nursing practice and community participation. However, recruitment of nurses to rural settings can be difficult. In response to this challenge and the rising demand within nursing education for community clinical placements, intensive, short-term, rural community clinical placements are being developed by urban universities. As yet, little research has examined the use of these placements for undergraduate nursing education. The purpose of this qualitative research study was to examine the experiences of students, registered nurse mentors, and clinical instructors in rural health clinical placements, as part of a larger study examining alternative clinical placements. Through use of the interpretive descriptive method, the perspectives of participants were elicited from focus groups and interviews. The paradox of nursing student placements in rural health is that limitations of the rural site became the impetus for nursing student learning and partnership. An implication is that service learning partnerships be pursued for mutual benefit of students, communities, and rural nurses.

Community Health Services↗
PubMed2004

Rural nurse practitioners in South Australia: recognition for registered nurses already fulfilling the role.

The introduction of the nurse practitioner role is hailed as a new initiative in the South Australian public health system. In reality, some registered nurses working in rural public health care facilities have been practicing in the role for many years. The role of the rural registered nurse, the pathway towards achieving rural nurse practitioner status and the anticipated advantages of implementing the rural nurse practitioner role will be presented.

Career Mobility↗
PubMed1991

Making gerontic continuing education accessible for rural nurses.

Special approaches need to be developed and used to make gerontic continuing education accessible to nurses in rural settings. Traditional workshops are time-intensive, and expensive to deliver, and are out of the reach of many nurses in rural settings because of great distances, inclement weather, expense, and lack of work coverage. The use of self-study modules featuring in-depth conversations with and demonstrations by gerontological experts is one way to economically deliver current gerontic continuing education to nurses in rural settings.

American Nurses' Association↗
PubMedDate not supplied

A rural nursing practicum: making it work.

Inciting the interest of baccalaureate students in the practice of nursing in a rural setting has been an ongoing challenge for many educators. The authors identify difficulties they encountered when attempting to involve students in a rural nursing practicum and delineate several strategies used to overcome these difficulties.

Attitude↗
PubMed1999

Effects of size of health service on scope of rural nursing practice.

This paper presents the findings of an analysis of the activities of rural nurses from a national audit of the role and function of the rural nurse (Hegney, Pearson and McCarthy 1997). The results suggest that the size of the health service (defined by the number of acute beds) influences the activities of rural nurses. Further, the study reports on the differences of the context of practice between different size rural health services and the impact this has on the scope of rural nursing practice. The paper will conclude that the size of the health service is an outcome of rurality (small population densities, distance from larger health facilities, lack of on-site medical and allied health staff). It also notes that the size of the health service is a major contextual determinant of patient acuity and staff skill-mix in small rural hospitals, and therefore the scope of rural nursing practice.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMed1996

The status of rural nursing in Australia: a review.

While much has been written about the practice role of remote area nurses in Australia, less is known about the role and function of the rural nurse. The majority of rural nurses practise in rural hospitals, community health settings and nursing homes. In contrast, the remote area nurse's work setting is generally involved with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander primary health care services. Rural nurses practice setting is usually located in a larger organisation than that of the remote area nurse. There is usually at least one medical practitioner in the town or on-call close by. Nurses who are employed in the smaller rural hospitals have what has been described as a 'specialist generalist' role. This means that they are required to be multi-skilled and competent in a wide range of nursing and non-nursing practice. In contrast, nurses who work in base/provincial hospitals, may have either a generalist or specialist role. This paper provides a summary of the literature on Australian rural nurses and develops some of the themes contained therein.

Australia↗
PubMed1998

Reflections on practice: defining rural nursing care.

This paper is the result of reflection on and content analysis of five studies in rural nursing by two independent research teams: one in south-west Victoria (three studies), the other in southern Queensland (two studies). The studies explored the nature of rural nursing work, the experiences of rural nurses and patients, and one attempt to promote an alternative mode of rural nursing service delivery. The major focus of this paper is the world view of nursing contained in the participant's experiences of rural health care and nursing in particular. The findings of the studies are examined to identify the concepts of care expressed by the participants and the role these concepts have in building a much needed conceptual framework for rural nursing education and practice.

Community Health Nursing↗