Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

Assignment:

For your assignment, please consider you have developed the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that enable your achievement of the nurse administrator competencies. Then write a minimum of 1000 word APA style essay, describing how this course has helped you achieve these outcomes and describe your quality improvement project that you will carry into your Capstone course. ( fall precaution on our skilled unit facility 2B). Include a minimum of ten (10) references with citations.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

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Courses in the Nursing Administrator specialty tract focus on achievement of these core competencies:

ASSESSMENT: The nurse administrator collects comprehensive data pertinent to the issue, situation, or trends.

IDENTIFIES ISSUES, PROBLEMS, OR TRENDS: The nurse administrator analyzes the assessment data to determine the issues, problems, or trends.

OUTCOMES IDENTIFICATION: The nurse administrator identifies expected outcomes for a plan individualized to the situation.

PLANNING: The nurse administrator develops a plan that prescribes strategies and alternatives to attain expected outcomes.

IMPLEMENTATION: The nurse administrator coordinates and implements the identified plan.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

HEALTH TEACHING AND HEALTH PROMOTION: The nurse administrator employs strategies to foster health promotion, health teaching, and the provision of other educational services and resources.

CONSULTATION: The nurse administrator provides consultation to influence the identified plan, enhance the abilities of others, and effect change.

EVALUATION: The nurse administrator evaluates progress towards attainment of outcomes.

Building on a previous 1994 study, this descriptive study reflects on the evershifting sands of the nurse manager role. This national survey is based on the Katz (1955)
conceptual framework of interrelated technical, human and conceptual competencies. An
instrument developed by the investigator for determining important nurse manager
competencies was validated using an expert panel of American Organization of Nurse
Executive (AONE) Nurse Manager Fellows. The research used a web-based survey to
collect information from hospital nurse managers who belong to AONE via a selfadministered competency instrument. Eighty one completed the online survey with
complete data for a response rate of thirteen percent.
Findings suggest the highest self-reported nurse manager competency ratings
included effective communication, retention strategies, effective discipline and decisionmaking. In contrast, the lowest self-reported nurse manager competencies included
nursing theory, case management and the research process.
Associations between competencies with individual and organizational variables
were studied. The impact of organizational variables of hospital size and span of control
had a medium effect. Magnet status impact was unremarkable. Individual variables of
gender, age, education, tenure as an RN, and tenure in current position also did not
significantly impact competency ratings. A large and medium effect was noted between
tenure in the management role on all the competency ratings within the five constructs.
The Chase Nurse Manager Competency Instrument underwent psychometric
testing as none had been done since the original 1994 study. Study data from 1994 and
2010 determined reliability and validity assessments with positive results. A crosswalk  Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay
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was also completed between the Chase Instrument and the 2005 AONE Nurse Manager
Leadership Collaborative Framework illustrating similar competency categories of focus.
Based on the findings the ten recommendations emerged; Provide realistic
expectations of the role; Provide a skill assessment and form a plan based on competency
development; Provide a structured orientation and development program which includes
30/60/90 day checkpoints; Establish long term mentorship building on the key
ingredients of inspiration and role modeling; CNO involvement is critical; Teach
Influence; Teach implementation strategies; Create the culture; Invest in Nurse Manager
support for Development of Staffing, Financial Acumen and Compliance; Enhance
communication skills at every level.
Among nursing leadership, the nurse manager role has been identified as critical
in the provision of high-performing, effective and efficient care in the patient care
delivery setting. This individual is responsible for quality, safety, satisfaction and
financial performance in alignment with regulatory and accrediting body requirements.
Excellence in horizontal and vertical communication is required as this role represents the
voice of the direct care nurse at the leadership table as well as the voice of the board of
trustees at the unit level.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

Nurses are tasked with enhancing the care delivery for patients to promote the highest ethical, professional, and legal standards that are outlined in their competency standards. The varied fields of nursing mean that each nurse in a particular field has a set of roles, duties, and responsibilities. The roles are determined by the rank, educational qualifications, and level of experience. In some instances, these core competencies may have similarities for nurses in different fields due to the job definition. For this analysis, the comparison of core competencies will be performed for nurse practitioners (NP) adult and nurse administrators.

The nurse practitioners core competencies are mainly based on the provision of quality health care to patients, educating and counseling their families, obtaining and recording patient’s medical information and history, and managing and providing best optimal care for patients. This means that this nurse is mainly concerned with providing direct form of care to the patients via regular interaction with them. On the other hand, the nurse administrator is responsible for human resource management, financial management, medical records management, and marketing tasks. Interaction between these nurses and patients is minimal. It only occurs on rare and unique occasions.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

Nursing is not just a collection of tasks. To provide safe and effective care to the clients, nurses must integrate knowledge, skills and attitudes to make sound judgement and decisions. This essay describes some of the essential knowledge, skills and attitudes of nursing and discusses why they are essential attributes of a competent nurse.

Nursing knowledge and clinical skills
These are obvious essentials for nursing practice. Nurses are required to perform many clinical tasks, for instance physical assessments and injections, which require competent clinical skills to ensure safe outcomes for patients. A broad base of nursing knowledge including physiology, …show more content…
Patients expect nurses to be compassionate and compassion is one of the main criteria patients evaluate the quality of nursing practice (Graber & Mitcham, 2004). Respect is another essential attitude. Nurses are required to practise “in a way that acknowledges the dignity, culture, values, beliefs and rights of individuals/groups” (ANMC, 2006). To deliver effective and non-discriminatory nursing care to clients, it is essential that nurses recognise and respect diversities in culture, values, beliefs, thinking, opinions and lifestyles (Ervin, 2005), and clients’ right to privacy, confidentiality and dignity.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

The NP is involved with managing and monitoring how care is applied to patients. The NP is tasked with advising patients on the best possible care types based on equipment availability within the hospital, cost of care, and type and advancement of the disease in a patient (American Association of Colleges of Nursing, 2004). In contrast, the nurse administrator is only involved in monitoring the availability of equipments, type and quality of care being given by the NP, and assessing cost parameters for the different services offered at the hospital. However, one commonality of these two competencies is based on identifying and recommending cost parameters for different care delivery services, as well as the methodology of service delivery for all nurses for different ailments.

Nursing care has something to do with organizing, planning, implementing and evaluating. This simply means that nursing as a field of expertise shares a common bond with management. Management by definition is putting things into a meaning order to produce favourable results to a certain organization. Without nursing management, the whole delivery system will be on a chaos.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

Nursing management need people in order to implement such management standards. These people should have good leadership skills, critical thinkers and versatile by nature. Clinical nurse managers embodies such ideals. They are actually pearls of the hospital administration as they are the direct managing body in contact with the staff nurses down to the non-nursing personnel. They serve as middle men between the top management officials and the staff nurses. Clinical nurse managers would usually focus their energy in solving the unit’s problem, perform auditing on the medical supplies being used, organize and forward medical records, perform staffing recruitment and evaluation.

Clinical nurse managers also take hands on patient care and take that information in order to collaborate with other health care professionals. They also bring the staff nurses closer to the policies and objectives of the unit as well as the hospital by role modelling. They also direct nursing activities and other administrative activities assigned to the unit. Staffing schedules are also done by them in order to promote fair distribution of manpower.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

Aside from the administrative roles, they also assume a great deal of specialization. Some may specialize in specific age groups such as paediatrics or geriatrics.

Another core competency for the NP is their role in advocating for policies aimed at improving the quality of care. These policy recommendations are based on their direct involvement in financing, medicine and diagnosis provision, community programs, and monitoring patient numbers, types of diseases, and available labor and equipment to handle them. However, these nurses do not have powers or abilities to effect any changes. Instead, the nurse administrator is the authority figure whose core competency involves the assessment of current practices, organization and service delivery, and providing strategies and guidelines for changing and improving these areas. They can seek the advice and assistance of NPs to effect these changes since the latter is in direct contact with agents of service delivery (American Association of Colleges of Nursing, 2004). However, some policies and decisions passed by the nurse administrator need to be passed on to senior hospital administrator since they could affect the functionality, modus operandi, or financial outlook of the hospital.Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

The NP is tasked with provision of an evidence-based care delivery to the patients. This results in the NP diagnosing the patient, providing medications, and educating the patient on the type of care being delivered, its level of failure or success, and other treatment options available for the patient. This means that the NPs role as the primary caregiver for the patients results in their competency having to be optimal and professional to ensure that they are not liable to malpractice when performing patient care.

Contrastingly, the nurse administrator does not engage in direct care of patient. Instead, it is her role to monitor the NPs continually on their service delivery. Additionally, to analyze the NPs practice and care delivery, the nurse administrator is responsible for performing regular assessments of not only individual nurses, but also to interact with patients and rate their acceptability, recommendations, and care delivery methodologies that would enhance the services offered by the medical institution . Therefore, the nurse administrator needs to finesse her qualifications and skills to ensure that she is able to manage and assess different parameters that are necessary for improving the quality of care being provided by nurses (APRN Consensus Work Group & the National Council of State Boards of Nursing APRN Advisory Committee, 2008).Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay

The nurse administrator is also tasked with performing regular finance checks on payment methods, pricing of care, creating and assessing financial records, and assessing source funding for different hospital projects and types of services (Institute of Medicine, 2011). This means that it is plausible that the nurse administrator have basic accounting knowledge. Contrastingly, the NPs competency is to provide professional services that are in tandem with the hospital business and financial strategies. Their access to financial information is limited, as compared to the nurse administrator.

Finally, a commonality between the core competencies of the two nurse fields is their role and requirement to support advances in the medical field that are relevant to their field of practice and quality of care. Support for technological developments, new medicine, and newer government regulations are a prerequisite for the NP and the nurse administrator since they directly affect their service delivery to their patients. Additionally, these two nurses are mandated to not only support these developments, but also formulate strategies and methodologies for integrating them into their fields of practice. Nurse Administrator Competencies Essay