The International Council of Nurses (ICN) annually designates May 12 as International Nurses Day to commemorate Florence Nightingale's birthday. In the United States, we celebrate National Nurses Week every year from May 6 to 12, leading up to the international celebration. The week is promoted through the American Nurses Association (ANA), a national nursing organization member of the ICN.
The global theme for International Nurses Day 2018 is Nurses: A Voice to Lead-Health is a Human Right. The campaign's aim is to position nurses as leaders: "Nurses are essential in transforming healthcare and health systems such that no person is left behind, without access to care or impoverished because of their need for health care."1 The key word in this statement is "transforming." Transformation is defined as making a thorough or dramatic change in the form, appearance, or character of something. With almost 21 million nurses and midwives worldwide, we have the power to create change.2
Nursing: A conduit for healthcare change
ICN President Annette Kennedy sends this message to the world's nurses, "Let us join our voices together to be a voice to lead by supporting a people-centered approach to care and health systems, and ensuring our voices are heard in influencing health policy, planning, and provision."3 Chapters in the annual ICN toolkit provide background and guidance in four specific areas: Health is a Human Right; Unpacking the Complexity of Access to Health Care; Investment and Economic Growth; and Policy to Practice-Practice to Policy. Case studies are featured as exemplars of nurses taking the lead through innovative approaches to increase access to quality healthcare and improve outcomes for a population.
Two featured U.S. cases include NP-led retail clinics at Walmart stores in rural healthcare professional shortage areas and a community-based care transition program in Arizona that customizes care to meet the needs of older adults to prevent hospital readmissions and keep these patients in the community. As usual, the International Nurses Day website contains a wealth of information for nurses that is free to download.
Celebrating National Nurses Week
This international call to action logically leads to this year's National Nurses Week theme, Nurses: Inspire, Innovate, Influence. The ANA has developed a downloadable toolkit for open use; it contains important information and resources to help you plan and execute your own celebration.4 Many employers plan special events during the week, so be sure to remind your employer to participate. I propose a statement using the three I's: I am a nurse who can inspire others by my actions to become leaders, to innovate and design new approaches that will have a lasting influence on healthcare access, delivery, and policy.
Inventing the Nurse Practitioner in America
If you are attending the Spring 2018 National Conference for Nurse Practitioners in Lake Buena Vista, Florida from May 9 to 12, you will be inspired by the unique keynote address, Inventing the Nurse Practitioner in America. It is a documentary detailing how innovative practices of pioneer NPs who dared to take a stand for healthcare as a human right became major influences in healthcare delivery and health policy in the United States. Historically, NPs have embodied the concepts of the three I's, and how fitting that this documentary is shown during National Nurses Week 2018.
Jamesetta A. Newland, PhD, FNP-BC, FAANP, DPNAP, FAAN
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF [email protected]
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