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Montana Nurses
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Association
Provider Newsletter: October, 2014
Visits to Approved Providers
Over the past several months, Pam and Kathy have been making “on site” visits to Approved Provider units. This gives us
a wonderful opportunity to meet your team, see your “homes”, discuss the work you are doing, and answer any
questions you may have that are specific to your provider unit. Thank you to those of you who have hosted our visits! If
we haven’t visited you yet, we’ll be coming! We will contact you to schedule a mutually convenient day and time.
MNA Convention Continuing Education
Thank you to those of you who participated as faculty or learners at the 102nd annual MNA Convention in Helena on
Oct. 1-3. It was a wonderful 3-day opportunity for professional sharing, learning, and networking. The theme of this
year’s conference was “nurses as key members of the healthcare team”, and sessions focused on the importance of all
members of the healthcare team learning and working together to provide better and safer patient care. We will be
continuing this theme with next year’s provider update as we think about how you can be involved in planning and
implementing interprofessional continuing education. If you were unable to attend convention this year, please mark
your calendars now for September 30-October 2, 2015, for next year’s convention. The theme will be “Nursing: The
Heart of Health Care”. If you have information that you would like to share, either in a podium session or a poster
presentation, please contact Kathy (kathy@mtnurses.org).
New White Paper from ANCC COA
The American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation has published its second white paper. You
may remember that the first paper, published in 2013, focused on the value of accreditation for continuing nursing
education. The second paper addresses the importance of evaluating the impact of continuing nursing education on
outcomes for professional nursing practice and patient care. This an open source document and can be retrieved from
http://www.nursecredentialing.org/Accreditation/ResourcesServices/Evaluating-the-Impact-CNE-Outcomes.pdf Please
feel free to use it to support the value of the work you do!
Montana Nurses Association is accredited as an approver of continuing nursing education by the American Nurses
Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation.
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Writing and Documenting Outcome Measures in Your
Provider Application – 004 and QO5
You are required to identify your provider unit’s goals for the past 12 months, along with the outcome measures you
have been tracking related to nursing professional development. This is, in fact, the foundation for the new COA white
paper referenced above. How do you identify what outcome measures you want to track, and how do you determine
the way you will measure success? When you are looking at OO4 and QO5, you need to consider the total picture of the
work of your provider unit for the past year. In order to address these items, you need to think beyond individual activity
evaluation and aggregate your evidence to reflect the “big picture” of the difference you have made.
The provider application includes a suggested list of quality outcome measure categories related to nursing professional
development. Please note that these are ONLY suggestions – not a list from which you are required to choose. Also, the
list is only a list of suggested areas to evaluate; it does not provide a specific outcome statement in relation to any of
these possible choices. In selecting the outcome measure(s) you want to address in your provider unit, think about the
goals you have identified for your provider unit and the types of activities you are providing in order to meet those
goals. The outcome measure, by definition, should be measurable and should be relevant to the overall strategic goals
of the provider unit and the organization.
Examples of quality outcome measures related to nursing professional development (adapted from ANCC, August, 2014)
1. A hospital identified a strategic goal of improving RN-MD communication. The quality outcome measure might
be: improve satisfaction score for RN-MD communication by 10% from previous year’s satisfaction survey.
2. A specialty nursing organization in perioperative nursing has a strategic goal to ensure perioperative nurse
compliance with a new evidence-based standard. The quality outcome measure might be: by 2015, 75% of
member nurses will self-report intent to change practice related to the updated standard in perioperative
nursing.
3. A continuing education provider has a strategic goal to increase interprofessional collaborative practice of its
learners. The quality outcome measure might be: At 6 months after participating in a series of educational
activities, 50% of learners will self-report collaborating with members of other professions in the practice
setting.
In order to demonstrate an impact on nursing professional development, you need to measure outcomes of learners at
the individual activity level, either at the conclusion of the educational activity, longitudinally after the educational
activity, or both. Then, data can be aggregated to measure the overall impact of the provider unit on the identified
nursing professional development outcome measure. This is the evidence you will document in QO5.
Evaluating the impact of continuing education on the professional practice of nursing helps to demonstrate the link
between continuing education and outcomes achieved as a result of that learning and demonstrates the value of lifelong learning.
Montana Nurses Association is accredited as an approver of continuing nursing education by the American Nurses
Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation.
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If you have questions about writing goals and outcome measures or collecting data to measure the evidence, please feel
free to contact us. If you have a “success story” in terms of developing and measuring outcomes that you would like to
share at the 2015 provider update, please let us know that, too!
Upcoming Activities
October 23, 2014 at 10:00 a.m. - End of Life Choices and Challenges – webinar
November 13, 2014 at 3:30 p.m. – Moral Distress and Ethical Dilemmas - webinar
January 25 & 26th, 2015 – Transition to Practice: To provide tips, tools and resources to enable the newly
licensed registered nurse to effectively transition from student to engaged professional. Helena
March 13- 14, 2015 – APRN Pharmacology Conference, Helena
April 19 – 21, 2015 —Labor Retreat, Chico Hot Springs
May 7 - 8, 2015 – Alaska Provider Update - Anchorage
May 14, 2015 – Montana Provider Update – Helena
September 30 – October 2, 2015 – Montana Nurses Association 103rd Convention – Helena
MNA Independent Study Library Available Online @ www.mtnurses.org
Contact Information
Pam Dickerson, PhD, RN-BC, FAAN, Director of Continuing Education
pam@mtnurses.org
1-406-465-9126
Kathy Schaefer, CE Specialist
kathy@mtnurses.org
1-406-442-6710
Montana Nurses Association is accredited as an approver of continuing nursing education by the American Nurses
Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation.