Global gathering calls for greater investment in nursing

More than 6,000 nurses from 125 countries gathered in Montreal July 1 to 5 for the biannual International Council of Nurses (ICN) Congress, a learning and networking opportunity around the theme, Nurses Together: A Force for Global Health. In the first such meeting held since the pandemic’s start, 30 attendees representing the American Nurses Association (ANA) gave 25 presentations covering various topics. ANA Past President Ernest J. Grant, PhD, RN, FAAN, spoke on advancing health equity by addressing racism in nursing.

Several dignitaries, including U.S. Representative Lauren Underwood (D-IL), an ANA-Illinois member, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, addressed the audience. In a plenary presentation on leadership, Rep. Underwood noted that more work is needed to grow and diversify the nursing workforce. She also called for evidence-based staffing levels. Ghebreyesus called for addressing the global shortage of nurses by investing in nursing education, employment, and retention.

The Council of National Nursing Association Representatives (CNR), ICN’s governing body, also held its biennial meeting in Montreal, June 29 to July 1. ANA President Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, PhD, MBA, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, Chief Nursing Officer Debbie Hatmaker, PhD, RN, FAAN, and Vice President of Nursing Programs Cheryl Peterson, MSN, RN, represented ANA as the U.S. voting member. Among other actions, the CNR passed an emergency resolution demanding humane treatment of migrants, condemning the violation of migrants’ human rights, and urging action by WHO and stakeholders in promoting the health of refugees and migrants.

The CNR also addressed the pressing need for more investment to bolster the nursing workforce and enable nurses to contribute to creating sustainable health systems. “Our discussions at this CNR have shown the unity of the world’s most influential nurses in addressing the challenges of the day,” said ICN President and ANA Past President Pamela F. Cipriano, PhD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, who presided over both events.

2023 MFP Training Institute fosters bold leadership

Bold leadership was encouraged during the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Minority Fellowship Program (MFP) at the American Nurses Association (ANA) 2023 Intensive Training Institute June 22 to 25.

MFP fellows, National Advisory Committee members, alumni, students and faculty, nursing organizations, and friends of the MFP at ANA convened in Washington, D.C., to discuss health equity and minority psychiatric-mental health nurse leadership. The 2023 Institute’s theme was Changing Challenging Mental Health Systems: BIPOC Psychiatric Nurses Boldly Leading.

During the Institute’s Hill Day on June 22, MFP fellows had 31 meetings with congressional staff to discuss behavioral health policies impacting psychiatric-mental health nursing practice and behavioral healthcare in their home states.

Institute session topics included health disparities, mentoring through narrative stories, and building media competency. Attendees also enjoyed panel presentations on professional development and a keynote address from Georgia State Representative Park Cannon.

“As we think about what being a bold leader means, it might not mean marching on the Capitol and putting it on social media,” said Cannon, who also works as a doula. “It might be taking that 7:30 AM call with a committee chairperson about a pilot program.”

The Institute also held graduation celebrations for the MFP class of 2022-2023 and engagement activities at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian.

The MFP at ANA receives funding from SAMHSA, which makes fellowships available to ethnic, minority, and racial psychiatric nursing students. Learn more at emfp.org.

Advancing nursing knowledge in precision health 
and genomics

Workgroup, building on survey results, to develop competencies

By Evangeline Fangonil-Gagalang, PhD, MSN, RN, and Mary Anne Schultz, PhD, MBA, MSN, RN, FAAN

The 2021 American Nurses Association (ANA) Membership Assembly recommended that ANA launch a strategic initiative to integrate precision health and genomics into basic and advanced nursing practice. Considerable behind-the-scenes work has since been underway. This update outlines the progress of and future products from these efforts.

One of the first steps ANA took after the Membership Assembly was to build on an earlier Genetic and Genomics Workgroup’s efforts to include precision health in nursing practice. The original workgroup surveyed practicing nurses’ knowledge, confidence, competence, and receptivity about integrating genomics into nursing practice. This workgroup found in 2012 that despite respondents agreeing that genomics is very important in their practice, they had fair or poor confidence in implementing it.

The new Precision Health and Genomics Workgroup in 2023 launched a large-scale national survey investigating the knowledge and competencies of practicing nurses in genomics as well as precision health. With rapid advancement in genomics and precision health over the past decade, this survey, which is now closed, will provide the workgroup with a baseline assessment of nurses’ attitudes, knowledge, and use of genomics and precision health, thereby guiding resource and training priorities.

A smaller subgroup also will use the survey results to create a set of precision health competencies slated for release in 2024. These competencies will communicate expectations for nurses in using information about an individual and their environment made possible by data-rich connected care encounters.

Precision health is similar to precision medicine, in which healthcare providers use individuals’ unique risks to establish personalized treatments, but it 
provides a broader scope by using an individual’s environment and lifestyle to prevent diseases and promote health.

Precision health enables people to do more for themselves by using nontraditional medical approaches and devices, including Fitbits and direct-to-consumer genetic test kits. The approach has gained momentum in improving people’s lives not only through a traditional medical model of treating the sick, but also in predicting and preventing illnesses based on an individual’s behaviors, experiences, and environmental risk factors.

Nursing, as the most trusted healthcare profession, has an obligation to establish a multi-faceted initiative to overcome organizational and nursing practice deficits in precision health and genomics. By developing and implementing appropriate competencies in nursing practice, the profession can achieve this aim.

— Evangeline Fangonil-Gagalang, PhD, MSN, RN, is undergraduate nursing program director and an assistant professor in the department of nursing at California State University, San Bernardino.

Mary Anne Schultz, PhD, MBA, MSN, RN, FAAN, is NCLEX 
success specialist, professor emerita and informaticist and former department chair at California State University San Bernardino. The authors are on the Precision Health and Genomics Workgroup and ANA\California members.

Additionally, Laurie Badzek, LLM, JD, MS, RN, FAAN, FNAP, and Kathleen Calzone, PhD, RN, AGN-BC, FAAN, serve on 
the Genetics and Genomics Workgroup. Badzek is dean and professor at the Ross and Carol Nese College of Nursing at The Pennsylvania State University and a Pennsylvania State Nurses Association member; Calzone is a research geneticist in the Genetics Branch of the Center for Cancer Research at the National Cancer Institute and a Maryland Nurses Association member.

References

Calzone KA, Jenkins J, Yates J, et. Survey of nursing integration of genomics into nursing practice. J Nurs Scholarsh. 2012;44(4):428-36. doi:10.1111/
j.1547-5069.2012.01475.

Feero WG. Introducing “genomics and precision health.” JAMA. 2017;317(18):1842-3. doi:10.1001/jama.2016.20625