The year 2020 will be a year that will go down in the history books. It started smoothly and then, wham, we were all in shelter-in-place due to a worldwide pandemic. It was named the Year of the Nurse and Midwife by the World Health Organization1; campaigns for that honor were launching, conferences were planned, airline tickets had been purchased, and, suddenly, in-person conferences were canceled and virtual education and conferences began, telehealth was prevalent, and the world started talking about handwashing. Isn't it ironic that Florence Nightingale essentially invented handwashing and aseptic technique? The year 2020 also brought great unrest to our country, as we not only experienced a pandemic but also encountered protests, racial inequity, violence, wildfires, hurricanes, global warming, and an election year like no other. The pandemic revealed racial inequities in care and morbidity, and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement published a guide to help health care organizations achieve health equity. Significant disparities in life expectancy and other health outcomes persist across the United States. Health care has a significant role to play in achieving health equity.2 Nursing will play a vital role in this work.
The year 2020 theme and the pandemic have caused us, as nurses, to deeply reflect on our profession and the contributions we make to our community, our patients, and society. Now we ask what does the future hold for nursing? What is our "new normal"? Nursing clearly stepped up to the plate to take the lead on multiple initiatives along the continuum. At the same time, our nursing pipeline was at risk as nursing students could not obtain their clinical placements in many places due to COVID-19 and some graduations were delayed. Once the dust settles, we may have a nursing shortage worse than ever before and we need to continue to come up with creative ways to educate these students clinically, including the increased use of simulation.
This issue, "A Call to Action: Moving the Past to the Future," focuses on where we have been and where we need to go in nursing. Guest Editors Drs Pat Yoder-Wise and Joyce Batcheller have collected quality articles that provide us with insight into important work that nursing leaders have been involved with and continue to be in the future. Joyce Batcheller interviewed Dr Susan B. Hassmiller, the senior adviser for nursing at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, who notes the progress we have made relative to the Institute of Medicine, now the Academy of Medicine, future of nursing report.3 We have exceeded the goal for doctorally prepared nurses and are making great headway with the Nurses on Boards Coalition. The number of BSN-prepared nurses has tripled since 2010, and this continues to be a goal that in some regions is controversial. Dr Beverly Malone's article provides us with a state of the world of nursing! Dr Janice Brewington writes about the status of the Nurses on Boards initiative, the journey we have been on, and where we are headed, which includes specific competencies for board participation/membership. As we know from last year, our overall competencies have changed as we have gained skills at navigating our health systems differently in our "new normal," and Virginia Morse and Nora Warshawsky's article is timely as they talk about the evolving competencies for the future of nursing leadership.
Let's hope that 2021 is a better year and that we can all apply what we have learned from leading others and caring for patients during a pandemic to the future as our world has changed. Nursing will continue to lead through the storm and the recovery.
Please contact me if you have article ideas and follow me on Twitter: @ktwaxman, and when tweeting, use the hashtag: #NAQJournal.
Thank you for all you do for nursing, our patients, and our communities.
-KT Waxman, DNP, MBA, RN, CNL, CHSE, CENP, FSSH, FAONL, FAAN
Editor-in-Chief
Nursing Administration Quarterly
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