The IOM report released a compelling report on the future of nursing, the changes in nursing roles and the advanced healthcare system. The IOM report has continued to have an impact on nursing at individual, policy and organizational levels. This paper will focus on the influence of the IOM Report on nursing and the scope of practice in the advanced healthcare system. The ultimate objective of the IOM report is to boost the patient results and improve health care for varied populations, with nursing as the vital element needed to meet the goal.
Four Key Messages
Nurses need to exercise to the full level of their training and education (Institute of Medicine, 2010a). Nurses have exceptional amounts of skills and knowledge gained through training and education that improve their nursing practice experience. Training and education are effective in professional development since they facilitate the transition of the nurse practice for the new students and graduates by improving their competency and the quality of patient care throughout the nursing career.
Nurses must acquire high education and training levels through enhanced education systems that endorse continuous academic development (Institute of Medicine, 2010a). Ideally, to ensure patient-centred care and safe care delivery, the nursing education system has to be improved. Considerably, improved education systems will close the gap between the nursing practice and the complicated care situations that need high levels of competencies to deliver high-quality care. High levels of education have improved the nursing practice through increased teamwork, system improvement, evidence-based practice and research, collaboration and effective leadership.
Nurses ought to be full partners with healthcare specialists in restructuring healthcare in the U.S (Institute of Medicine, 2010a). The involvement of nurses in restricting healthcare in the United States has increased nurses’ responsibilities and their contribution to the healthcare systems. For instance, this has promoted collaboration where nurses work in inter-professional team healthcare teams. Through this, nurses have effectively identified the inefficiencies and problems, designed and implement improvement strategies and assessed the effectiveness of these strategies. Therefore, nurses have increasingly taken leadership responsibilities, which have improved their scope of practice.
Appropriate workforce organization and policymaking need improved collection and information setup (Institute of Medicine, 2010a). Organizing comprehensive variations in the arrangement of the nursing personnel will inform changes in education and training in nursing practice. This will be effective in determining where healthcare needs are being achieved and falling short and indicate the overlapping tasks and responsibilities in the care providers. The workforce planning programs will facilitate systematic monitoring of healthcare workers to improve the scope of practice.
Impact of the IOM Report on Nursing Education and Leadership
The IOM report has influenced nursing education and leadership by emphasizing the need for more educational training to improve the nurses’ responsibilities in the complex healthcare system (Institute of Medicine, 2010). All nurses need to develop their leadership capabilities and function as complete partners with general practitioners to improve the healthcare system. IOM report states that nurses’ achievement of high education and training levels will boost their core competencies in the advanced healthcare system.
Additionally, the nurses are required to understand their responsibilities and those of others to work collaboratively. Lack of adequate knowledge and poor education can lead to patient care errors that are costly. Therefore, improved knowledge through education is essential in preventing errors and increasing the quality of care. Understanding proper nursing practice and education is a commitment to being a professional nurse who continuously improves patient care.
Through education and training, the BSN nurses will achieve higher-level skills that will enable them to respond to the increasing demands (Institute of Medicine, 2010). Education will make a seamless transition that will improve the quality of services through their careers, thus lifelong opportunities. Nursing education and training will increase the experience through research, evidence-based practices and collaboration, which will make the nurses more knowledgeable, thus offering better patient care. This will also ensure that BSN nurses take responsibility for identifying issues and devising improvement tactics and monitoring improvement over time, and ensuring that the essential adjustment has been made to improve patient care.
Focus on a Diverse Aging Population
Evolving nursing education and roles have resulted in improved nursing activity to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse and ageing population. Currently, there is an increase in the ageing population and diverse population. The ageing population has constituted twenty per cent of the total population in the United States. Therefore, the changing landscape and profile of the population and the health care structure has demanded that the role of nurses and nursing education needs to shift to offer patient-centred care (Sochalski and Weiner, 2011). Globalization has also increased the rate of population growth, which has made it essential for healthcare professionals such as nurses to respond to the changing population’s needs by improving their roles and education. The nurses are expected to perform the full range of their training, competencies, and learning to facilitate inter-professional collaboration, thus improving the nursing practice in the changing healthcare landscape.
Professional Development and Lifelong Learning
Professional development and lifelong learning among nurses offer them problem-solving and critical thinking skills to solve issues that arise during the care process. Considerably, nurses have to be up to date to remain current in the health care practices and the nursing profession. Due to the changing population and needs, nurses have to continue learning to gain more skills and knowledge to competently fulfil the standards of care and scope of practice (Institute of Medicine, 2010). For instance, a large fragment of the patient population is over 65 years. This has led to health complexities and evolving practices due to problems such as chronic health issues. Nurses need the right expertise to treat the elderly population and help them in managing illness such as diabetes, kidney diseases and dementia.
Lifelong learning will enable the nurses to build collaborative relationships with coworkers and patients, thus reducing mortality rates. Professional development in nursing brings up to date on the latest technology, techniques and evidence to be offer quality care to patients (Sochalski and Weiner, 2011). Nurses can effectively get ready for the demographic alteration through professional development. For instance, they may think about focusing on geriatrics and other associated fields to fill the gap for nurse leadership as well as expertise. They may also play a great role in effective patient care delivery care through designing administrative and clinical home care plans. Lifelong learning and professional development guarantees that the nurses are ready to handle the loads of the ageing population and deal with realities in the ageing population.
Managing Care in an Evolving Care System
Nurses can contribute in effective patient care in a changing healthcare system in various ways. This is because they have taken new and expanded roles in the healthcare system. Nurses have played new roles in the coordination of care in the evolving healthcare system through collaboration with various healthcare providers to manage different caseloads of patients (Sochalski and Weiner, 2011). Nurses have played a great role in inter-professional teams that have embraced the latest medical technology to improve the quality of care. They have focused on primary and upstream preventive care, population health management, geriatric care, informatics design, patient coaching and management of patient care in community settings. Nurses have engaged in research and evidence-based practices that have enabled nurses to gain knowledge and skills that have shaped patient safety.
Conclusion
In summation, the IOM report has detailed the changes in the healthcare systems due to demographics, globalization and technology, which has affected the demands and expectations on nursing. The report has also recommended the collective actions, practices, and education required to appropriately shift to the changing healthcare environment.
