The Benefits of a Professional Practice Framework to Prepare and Advance Practice in Order to Achieve Desired Outcomes

Nursing is a unique discipline that embraces the art and science of holistic patient care. The reality is we have lived in a gap for many years between education and practice, between nursing and other disciplines, between traditional and evidence-based practice, and between paper and emerging automation (informatics). This presentation will provide a brief overview of each of these realities and how the “glue in the gap” is utilizing a professional practice framework to prepare and advance practice in order to achieve common desired outcomes.

Ground-breaking efforts of co-creating a clinical practice framework based on a six-year pilot that has grown over 20 years into an active international consortium utilizing a common evidence-based interdisciplinary practice framework will be shared. The fundamental elements of the professional practice framework will be reviewed, including the unique connection of culture/practice transformation to evidence-based knowledge at the point-of-care. The evidence-based knowledge is intentionally designed and formatted to integrate with healthcare technology in order to advance practice and achieve quality patient outcomes. To prepare nursing and other allied health students to practice in environments rich in evidence-based practice and technology, Practice-Education Partnerships that utilize the framework within curriculums will be shared. Examples of shifting from traditional nursing care plans to evidence-based clinical practice guidelines that consider and/or integrate the interdisciplinary team will be explored.

In conclusion, outcomes from multiple sites in North America will be shared as it relates to improved healthy work cultures, CMS Core Measures, and other quality outcomes. Examples of alignment to several national and global initiatives and efforts will also be shared such as Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE), Technology Informatics Guiding Education Reform (TIGER) and Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI).