ANA President Mary Foley, MS, RN, participated in a panel focusing on systems approaches and specifically outlined the parallels between patient safety and health care worker safety. In her remarks, Foley identified basic changes that, when implemented, would reduce or eliminate staff and patient injuries. These changes included improved staffing; changing organizational culture so that nurses are supported, afforded professional autonomy, and looked to as experts and appropriate decision-makers; and moving toward non-punitive approaches to understanding and preventing error. Also highlighted during the conference was research on staffing and outcomes, fatigue and human error, and trends in cost and incidence of work-related injuries.

The meeting was held in Pittsburgh, PA, Oct. 17-18, and included representatives from the Veterans Administration, the Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality, the National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health, the Health Care Finance Administration, the American Hospital Association, the Occupational Safety & Health Administration. Also in attendance were representatives from individual hospitals and long term care facilities, as well as staff from the Service Employees International Union, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees and the National Council of State Boards of Nursing.

In the fall 1999, IDSA’s Emerging Infections Network (EIN) identified shortages of certain antibiotic agents and surveyed its membership to identify their perceptions of the shortage. At the time EIN, which is one of three CDC sponsored sentinel networks of approximately 850 infectious disease specialists, found that 87 percent of 485 respondents reported that they had encountered shortages of one or more antimicrobial agents in the previous three months.

Key words: assessment, competence, competency-based, evaluation, nursing education, performance examinations, testing concepts

A significant category of issues and problems related to promoting competence pertains to the limitations or absence of a cohesive conceptual framework that supports learning and assessment methods focused on practice competencies. Typically, teachers in academic and practice settings use traditional course objectives, lectures, and evaluation methods that often are characterized as teacher-focused, subjective, and inconsistent.

The NLRB appealed the ruling of the Sixth Circuit to the U.S. Supreme Court. At issue are the conflicts between various circuit courts regarding the supervisory status of nurses. Some circuit courts have enforced the NLRB’s findings that nurses are not supervisors, while other circuit courts have followed the Sixth CircuitCourt decision, which holds that nurses are supervisors.

ANA has been following this case and is exploring the possibility of filing a brief or joining in a brief.

Eleven of the country’s largest retailers, including Wal-Mart, Kmart and Albertson’s stores, said yesterday that they would stop selling the thermometers because mercury is an environmental hazard and because low-priced alternatives are available.

Mercury thermometers have been used in hospitals, doctors’offices and homes for decades. However, the devices have always posed health risks because mercury is highly toxic and can cause serious health problems, even in minuscule quantities.

The push to eliminate mercury health-care devices came from Health Care Without Harm, a coalition of international groups based in Falls Church, VA, which is attempting to eliminate pollution caused by health care practices. In 1997, ANA joined the coalition, now made up of more than 200 organizations internationally, in response to a House of Delegates report on pollution prevention.

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