Continuing Nursing Education in Queen Mary Hospital

Ms. Ruby Leung
School Principal/SNO (C&C), Queen Mary Hospital

Introduction

All nurses should have the responsibility to ensure that they are competent to fulfill the roles and functions for which they are entrusted. An essential component of this responsibility is the need for nurses to continually update and develop their knowledge and skills. This is important as advances in science and technology, re-organization of resources, changing demographics and societal needs, influence the health care workplace continually. The need of continuing education
is further augmented by rapid the development of communication channels and technology.

Institutional Philosophy

Although continuing education is a habitual and life-long pursuit for most nurses' for a minority group continuing education appears distant and unfamiliar to them. The establishment of the Continuing Nursing Education (CNE) system in Queen Mary Hospital serves as one of the means to enhance competencies of nurses and the standard of nursing practice through encouragement of life-long learning in professional nurses. Updated knowledge and skills are becoming more and more important due to the current demand for transparency and accountability in health delivery.

As the CNE system in Queen Mary Hospital emphasizes on planning, encouragement and recognition, CNE achievement is considered more a motivator than a means of control and punishment. This is especially important at the beginning of the scheme when cultivation of interest and need are crucial to its success.

Assessment and Planning of CNE Needs

CNE refers to any post-registration/ enrolment updating in education, skills or experience which are nursing or health related. Since Queen Mary Hospital is a tertiary health care center, the scope and intensity of educational needs is diverse but complex. The continuing education needs range from basic skills of patient communication to specialty-based training.

Each year, around the time of staff development review, individual nurses will discuss their development needs with his/her supervisor according to their own situation and development direction. The supervisor, in turn will consider the department and organizational plan in relation to the member of staff in order to come up with a development plan that fits the individual, department and organization. The clinical departments are then requested to submit a training and development plan to the Central Nursing Department, which will collate the training needs and coordinates with different centers and institutes in the provision of those educational programs.

Some courses and seminars are provided as in-house training in Queen Mary Hospital while the others are co-organized with Universities and other institutions. For specialty-based educational programs, we are mostly reliant on the provision by the Hospital Authority Head Office.

Some in-house courses/seminars are targeted to different disciplines of staff such as talks related to occupational safety and health and more effective patient partnerships. Some courses are an obligatory requirement for different grades and streams of staff such as customer service training; BCLS and advanced CPR courses while the rest are specific to nursing.

The CNE System in Queen Mary Hospital

The CNE system is mainly one of self-reliance. It is based on the belief that CNE is basically a professional responsibility for every professional nurse. Each nurse has to assess his/her own learning needs and identify activities to meet those needs. The hospital will support in terms of study days and money
for the programme but has no obligation to cover all costs to staff.

In order to keep track of individual nurse's development activities, the Central Nursing Department issues a record book to each nurse. The nurse keeps a detailed record of his/her CNE activities and this record serves to notify and remind both the nurse and the supervisor of the CNE status.

Each Registered Nurse is required to fulfil a minimum of 45 points in 3 years while each Enrolled Nurse is required to obtain 30 points in 3 years. The system is not punitive and if a nurse cannot fulfil the requirement in the first year or so, the supervisor is encouraged to look at the cause and hopefully support the staff in achieving their development outlined in their plan.

There is a common database for the ward, department and Central Nursing Department in order to facilitate the planning and coordination of educational programs. Each party will have information of staff CNE status and supervisors are reminded to allocate resources and support fairly amongst staff so as to motivate and encourage everyone.

Implementing CNE in Queen Mary Hospital

A CNE Subcommittee was formed in early 2000. After a few months' work and planning, a paper on CNE policies and system including guidelines and CNE equivalencies table was complied for discussion in the Nursing Committee. Departmental Operations Managers (DOMs) were requested to take the message back to their unit and discussion was encouraged. In October 2000, the paper was endorsed and the system was implemented in January 2001.

In order to make the system work staff acceptance and support from central management and supervisors are crucial. Open forums were held to inform and consult staff before the actual implementation and the response was very encouraging with most nurses already prepared or actually involved in their own professional development.

Looking Forward

Queen Mary Hospital is only at the start of its long journey towards an effective CNE system. However, in view of the positive staff response, management support and commitment, it is certain that the staff and patients of Queen Mary Hospital will benefit from our effort of continuing development in our profession.

In moving forward on the CNE journey it is hoped that the hospital will provide more opportunities for staff to develop and flourish in line with the health care delivery system not only reactively but also proactively.