CREATIVITY AND
INNOVATION IN
NURSING
PROFESSION
The ANA Scope and Standards of
Practice (ANA, 2015) helps frame the
perspective
from
which
innovation takes place:
nursing
Nursing
is
the
protection,
promotion, and optimization of
health and abilities, prevention
of illness and injury, facilitation
of
healing,
alleviation
of
suffering through the diagnosis
and
treatment
of
human
response, and advocacy in the
care of individuals, families,
groups,
communities,
and
populations.
Contoso
Pharmaceuticals
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IMPORTANCE….
Nursing innovation is a fundamental source of
progress for health care systems around the
world. Nurses work in all settings with healthy
persons, all types of patients, families,
communities, health care personnel and
personnel in other sectors.
Nurses are critically positioned to provide
creative and innovative solutions that make a
real difference to the day-to-day lives of our
patients, organizations, communities and
profession (ICN, 2009)
Contoso
Pharmaceuticals
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 Nurses worldwide are engaged in innovative activities
on a daily basis; Activities motivated by the desire to
improve healthy person/patient care outcomes and the
need to reduce costs.
 Many of these initiatives have resulted in significant
improvements in the health of patients, populations and
health systems.
 In most health systems, nurses are the main
professional component of ‘front line’ staff providing up
to 80% of primary health care. As such, they are
critically positioned to provide the creative and
innovative solutions for current and future global health
challenges .
Contoso
Pharmaceuticals
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ISSUES AND CHALLENGES…
• The nursing contribution to health care innovation is seldom recognized,
publicized or shared among nursing and the wider public (Dil et al., 2012).
• Failure to acknowledge and encourage creativity in nurses may hinder
future development and innovations in nursing practice and in nursing
science.
• Nurses often encounters unexpected situations and involves taking care of
patients with different backgrounds and health conditions; hence, they
need to go beyond nursing routine and acquire creative thinking to make
useful decisions.
• Studies have shown that creativity is not highly rewarded in in NURSING
practice.
• Most studies on creativity have been conducted in nursing education, but
creativity in the clinical settings and its outcomes for patients, nurses and
health care organizations have not been extensively studied and its
consequences is still not clear. Hence, the area of creativity within the
medicine and nursing appears underdeveloped and the outcomes of
creativity in these fields are unknown.
Contoso
Pharmaceuticals
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Nursing Innovators….
1. EDGE RUNNERS
Nurse innovators are working to improve outcomes and the patient experience
by reimagining and redesigning healthcare and developing innovative models of care.
2. INNOVATIONS IN QUALITY IMPROVEMENT.
Initiatives such as the NQS guide quality improvement initiatives and the focus on
improved patient outcomes as a measure of payment.
3. ADVANCING HEALTH POLICY.
Innovative nurses are influencing the development of health policy, which is defined
by Longest (2016) as, “…authoritative decisions regarding health or the pursuit of health
made in the legislative, executive, or judicial branches of government that are intended to
direct or influence the actions, behaviors or decisions of others”.
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Pharmaceuticals
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Nursing Innovators:
4. INNOVATION IN HEALTH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Innovations in health information technology can significantly impact quality of care. ANA
and other nursing organizations have been strong promoters of new technologies, such as
telehealth, electronic health records (EHRs), and patient registries.
5. SIMULATION TRAINING
Use
of
simulation
experiences
has
brought
about
innovative
changes
in
nursing
education... Simulation training can cover a wide range of experiences ranging from role-playing to
full mission simulation involving a complex task that engages a team (Galloway, 2009). Use of
simulation experiences has brought about innovative changes in nursing education, including using
simulation to stimulate critical thinking and create unexpected events
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Pharmaceuticals
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OVERCOMING BARRIERS TO LEADING INNOVATIVE CHANGE :
 ONE APPROACH TO FOSTER INNOVATION IN NURSING IS TO UNDERSTAND PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS
AND ATTRIBUTES OF NURSE INNOVATORS TO DETERMINE WHETHER EDUCATIONAL LEVELS,
CERTIFICATION, TRAINING, COACHING, OR SOME OTHER VARIABLES IMPACT INNOVATIVE BEHAVIOR.
 SELF AWARENESS
 CREATING ENVIRONMENTS TO FOSTER INNOVATION
 DEVELOPING LEADERSHIP SKILLS
 RESILIENCE
 FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT SKILLS
 CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS.
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Pharmaceuticals
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As the nurses of today and tomorrow, we each have the
opportunity to pioneer change,” (Bradley,2019)
“Change in how we perceive our own profession and how we
view and provide care for those people who offer themselves
into our care every day.”
Contoso
Pharmaceuticals
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