Quality And Safety Education In Nursing (QSEN)

This process provides an effective method for handling all of the scientific and technical information as well as the emotional, social, and physical factors that they deal with for each patient. A national study is important to further educate nurses because it will enhance their knowledge and skills to continue improving quality and patient safety. Nurses play major roles in patient outcomes, monitoring and assessing patients and making necessary interventions to reduce any risks. Nurses also collaborate with other health care providers and act as educators to and advocates for patients and family members, and a I believe a national study will allow nurses to come together, let their roles as health care providers be known, and become health care leaders who make up a majority of the health care field and bring about policies to enhance the health care system.

In October 2005 the Quality and Safety Education for Nursing program was established. This program is funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. QSEN was developed specifically for future nurses to understand and be aware of key challenges such as the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are essential to constantly advance the quality and safety of the way healthcare systems work. The goal for QSEN is to reshape the identity of nursing so it includes the recommendations by the Institute of Medicine so there is a commitment to the quality and safety proficiency (Dycus, 2009).

Nursing sensitive indicators reflect the structure, process and outcomes of nursing care. The structure of nursing care is indicated by many factors such as supply of staff, education level and quality of care provided. Process indicators measure aspects of nursing care such as assessment, intervention, and RN job satisfaction. Patient outcomes that are determined to be nursing sensitive are those that improve if there is a greater quantity or quality of nursing care (Nursing world, 2013). In 1999, the American Nursing Association recognized a total of 10 indicators that apply to hospital based nursing care (Americansentinel.edu, 2017). Indicator such as pressure ulcers, patient falls and nosocomial infections are recognized in this list and are considered preventable with proper nursing action. Knowledge of these indicators could have assisted the nurses in several ways involving this case study involving Mr. J.

The overall goal through all phases of The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) is to address the challenge of preparing future nurses with the knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to continuously improve the quality and safety of the healthcare systems in which they work. In order to accomplish this goal, six competencies were defined. These competencies from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) are patient centered care, teamwork and collaboration, evidence-based practice, quality improvement, informatics and safety. Over a decade has passed since the Institute of Medicine’s reports on the need to improve the American healthcare system. The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses

Over time the health care industry has become more complex. Health care is rapidly evolving and continuing to complicate our delivery of care, which in turn has the same effect on quality of care. This steady evolution and change results in nursing shortages and an increase in the prevalence of errors being made. In hopes of preventing these errors and creating safe and high quality patient care, with the focus on new and improved ways of thinking, The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) initiative was developed. The QSEN focuses on the following competencies: patient-centered care, quality improvement, safety, and teamwork and collaboration. Their initiatives work to prepare and develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are necessary to make improvements in the quality and safety of health care systems (Qsen.org, 2014).

Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) was developed with the purpose of providing professional nurses with the knowledge, skills and attitudes (KSA) necessary to continuously improve the quality and safety of the health care systems within which they work (QSEN, 2014). However, since its implementation and integration in nursing education, studies show little progress in improving quality and safety in health care delivery (Dolansky & Moore, 2013). The purpose of this article critique is to evaluate the cause analysis and recommendations made by the authors.

Patient safety is of major concern in healthcare settings due to the preventable nature of events that sometimes lead to serious injury, and even death, for patients. This was catapulted to the forefront of healthcare delivery in 1999 when the Institute of Medicine wrote a scathing report; To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System, that highlighted "the lack of safety for patients in healthcare organizations" (Ulrich and Kear 2014). The National Patient Safety

The QSEN competencies’ that are of primary importance to me are teamwork and collaboration. QSEN in 2013 defined teamwork and collaboration competencies as the effective functioning of, communication, working together, respect, professionalism and quality of care in nursing environment. As a traveling nurse in the field, my overall experience was quite the contrary. Various nurse’s in the assigned facilities exhibited deliberate and harmful behaviors for example, bullying, indifferent, demeaning, and similar to lateral violence (LV). This often occurred from one employee to another; and was/is a significant problem in the nursing profession (Christie 2014 et al and QSEN in 2013).

Focusing her attention on nursing leaders, Dolansky and Moore wrote a thorough article exploring how effective the Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) initiative has been since its inception in 2005. The authors further examined the importance of expanding the QSEN framework from an individual approach to a systems approach. They described how expanding the QSEN framework will ultimately allow for an acceleration of quality and safety in both the individual and the healthcare environment. Accomplishing this goal means recognizing patterns that occur between a patient’s behavior and their environment (social, cultural, and so forth). Dolansky and Moore did an outstanding job of supporting their arguments by providing historical

The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (also known as QSEN) began in 2005 as a project to train nurses with necessary tools to be competent and safe nurses. QSEN was funded by the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation and was divided up into 3 phases, and the project’s lead investigator is Linda Cronenwett (qsen.org, 2014). During Phase 1 (2005-2007), 6 competencies were defined with the institute of medicine: patient centered care, teamwork and collaboration, evidence-based practice, quality improvement and informatics, and safety.

Case Western Reserve University. (2014). The evolution of the quality and safety education for nurses (QSEN) initiative. Retrieved from

One of the Quality and Safety Education of Nurses (QSEN) competency is patient care that, “recognize the patient or designee as the source of control and full partner in providing

The vision statement for QSEN is: “to inspire health care professionals to put quality and safety as core values to guide their work” (QSEN Institute, 2018b). QSEN has competencies developed to help guide the practice of nurses, both at the baccalaureate and graduate levels. The competencies that have been developed include: patient-centered care; teamwork and collaboration; evidence-based practice; quality improvement; safety; and, informatics (QSEN Institute, 2018b). The QSEN competencies that are specifically relevant to the current study include patient-centered care, evidence-based practice and safety. Patient-centered care relates to this study as the whole notion of wearable simulation will allow the participants to experience the realities of older age and potentially change their level of empathy towards this particular patient population, as QSEN describes how there is worth in seeing situations “through patient’s eyes” (QSEN Institute 2018a). Evidence based practice relates as the mere fact of determining if this is a worthwhile for an experience for nursing students (QSEN Institute 2018a). Safety is the main priority of nursing care, and it is imperative to find every way possible to ensure that nursing is a safe profession for the nurses and the patients that they serve (QSEN Institute 2018a). Safety can be enhanced

Prior to this week assignment I have never heard about the Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN). This week I learned that the QSEN main focus is to prepare future nurses who exhibit the basic fundamental knowledge, skill and beliefs that are needed to enhance the quality and safety of their workplace (Cronenwett et al., 2007). I think that their purpose is important because I remember how it was when I first graduated nursing school. I had the book smarts but had no real knowledge of what is was to be an actually nurse. I would say if it wasn't for my awesome preceptor I probably would have quit after my first day working in the intensive care unit.

The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) was developed to improve the quality and safety of the healthcare system. The QSEN project is an initiative to prepare future nurses their transition into practice with continuing education and research. The QSEN faculty and National Advisory Board developed six competencies as guides for future programs. From those six competencies I will discuss two that are relevant for nurses pursuing a career as a patient care coordinator, or as formerly known as case management.