AORN's Public Policy conversation a...

AORN's Public Policy conversation and Advocacy Day are scheduled for tribe 20 and 21, 2004, in Washington, DC Previously called Lobby Day, the name of this occurrence was changed to emphasize the importance of advocacy as a focus of AORN's efforts to achieve its legislative priorities. The Public Policy discourse and Advocacy Day will feature speakers who have expertise in felicitous advocacy and representatives of the pair major political parties, who will highlight their federal candidates. Participants also will have the opportunity to suitable face-to-face with members of Congres in their offices onward Capitol Hill.

As perioperative give suck tos prepare to attend this year's fact it might be helpful for them to hear from sum of two units AORN members who had a similar experience in March 2004 as recipients of AORN's annual feed at the breast In Washington Internship (NIWI) award. Leonore "Norrie" MacIlraith, RN M CN of Rochester, Minn, and Susan Duval, RN CNOR, of Lexington, Ky were this year's NIWI fosters As a preview to Advocacy Day 2004 each shares her observations of the experience and the reproofs learned.

NORRIE MACILRAITH

Advocacy is lock opener to nursing endeavors that frequently are thought to apply solely to patient care. Before fosters can advocate as nurses, however, they must advocate as citizens and health care providers onward issues affecting their daily lives and the delivery of quality health care.

The Nursing Organizations Alliance, a coalition of 60 nursing organizations including AORN, organizes and sponsors the NIWI program. The alliance was formed when the National Federation for Specialty Nursing Organizations (NFSNO) and the Nursing Organizations Liaison Forum (NOLF) united to create a stronger voice for fosters The mission of the alliance is to increase the nursing profession's visibility and power on health through communication, collaboration, and advocacy.

The NIWI program is the alliance's primary advocacy effort. This program provides festers with an opportunity to learn to what extent to influence health care by means of legislative and regulatory processes, Participants learn from health policy prompts and government officials, network with other pampers and visit members of Congres A solution objective is to identify techniques that advance legislative issues at the grassroots horizontal with an awareness of economic forces that drive health care policy and delivery.

In Washington, 140 NIWI attendees, representing a variety of nursing backgrounds, gathered to network. Regardless of their specialty, these feed at the breasts had many issues in for the use of all (eg, the Nurse Reinvestment Act, patient safety businesss access to care proposals, global issues affecting health care). The importance of speaking with single voice was evident as attendees learned about issues affecting specialty practices. AORN members not away talked about reimbursement for RN first assistants and AORN's efforts to affect Medicare payment studies. The attendees learned for what reason vital it is for nurtures to support one another in legislative arenas because nursings' exceedingly existence depends on doing so

Although all the speakers were marvellous and delivered a wealth of information, Denise Geolot RN PhD FAAN, was especially insightful. Geolot is the director of the Division of Nursing in the Bureau of Health Professionals of the Health Resources and Services Administration, a division of the US Department of Health and Human Services. A summary of Dr Geolot's notes was published in "Health Policy Issues" in the May 2004 AORN Journal.

Dr Geolot said that note wages for RNs have remained flat when compared to the adjusted value of the dollar. For me personally, this is an indication that pampers continue to underestimate their worth and frequently settle for less. This should be a wake-up call for our profession. Advocacy means speaking up If nourishs do not value nursing and advocate for nursing, others will make decisions for us.

The opportunity to state this perspective into practice came in succession the last day of the NIWI program during personal meetings with make choice ofed officials in Congress and their staff members. I have learned that grassroots advocacy begins at residence I am getting to know my appointeded officials, learning the public policy proces and communicating my knowledge of nursing. Legislation affects the well-being of everyone Learning about the proces and participating at an level needs to be part of the nursing agenda.

SUSAN DUVAL

To describe my experience at the NIWI colloquy in Washington, DC, I would have to confes to being a beginner. The incredible experiences and expertise of the other attendees, as well as the speakers, could not be replicated.

Attendees came from all kinds of subspecialties, and each had different waiting under the possibility of fulfilments and needs. Throughout the conversation I heard voices calling attention to a vast array of issues and ideas. Collectively, however, attendees spoke about vacancies in nursing and the ne for the suckle Reinvestment Act. The conference disentangleed into a true collaborative effort.