Advanced nursing practice.

摘要

How do you define and describe something as ubiquitous, and yet as elusive, as Advanced Nursing Practice (ANP)? Schober and Affara have risen to this challenge on behalf of ICN. They provide an essential guide on the extent of this phenomenon globally, and in terms of practice, education, regulation and research. Their reach in documenting what is going on in ANP is phenomenal. Nurses everywhere will find in this book the evidence to confirm what they may have felt only intuitively: the scope of ANP, whilst extremely broad, is associated with common core competencies irrespective of where it is carried out and/or what it is called. So far, so good; however, the picture that Schober and Affara provide can only be a cross section or a snapshot of a rapidly changing situation. They quote evidence to show that ANP in hospitals and in primary health care settings everywhere involves delegation from physicians, and that Advanced Nursing Practitioners 'can provide care at least equivalent to doctors in defined situations' (page 51). The difficulty, as I read it, is that this has been the case for at least a century or more, and will almost certainly continue to be so. For example, I understand that procedures such as urine testing, the taking of temperatures and blood pressures were all once the province of physicians, but now they are unquestionably accepted as the responsibility either of nurses, or care assistants. As health technology develops at an astonishing speed, this continuous delegation to others can only accelerate.