Wisconsin Board of Nursing Newsletter

By: Peter Kallio, DNP, CRNA, APNP

   Hello fellow nurses of Wisconsin. Here is another iteration of the Chair’s Corner. First, I need to tell you that I am on a bit of a leave of absence due to a health condition that will take a couple of months of treatment. The good news is that I have an excellent prognosis with early detection. What I would like to talk a bit about is being on the patient side of health care. As I write this column, I am sitting in the infusion center of Froedtert’s Moorland Reserve facility. I must say that the nursing care and compassion that I have received has been amazing. These nurses are focused, dedicated and truly caring. Nursing certainly is the backbone of healthcare. (Shout out to Laura and Julie.)

   The pandemic does not seem to want to go away. We must continue the push to reach herd immunity with the push for vaccinations. You are continuing to be the heroes of this pandemic with the direct care, vaccinating people, and the support roles you are providing our Covid patients. Your work in these unprecedented times is remarkable and I am extremely proud to be part of this profession.

   The Board of Nursing continues to be busy as we persist in our work with DSPS and the governor to make sure our own rules around the Nurse Practice Act do not create barriers to our nurses and for those that want to work here. There is important nursing legislation on the horizon with the Assembly and Senate Bills regarding APRN modernization: 2021 Senate Bill 394 & 2021 Assembly Bill 396.

   We have recently lost 2 long term members of this board due to term expiration. Both Luann Skarlupka (Public Member) and Jennifer Eklof (LPN member) were amazingly dedicated members to the Board of Nursing. I will personally miss each of them. They were partners in the true sense and had a dedication to safe nursing practice without reproach. Thank you for your service to Wisconsin.

   One duty that the Board of Nursing has is to protect the public in this state. Last newsletter, I talked about abuse. This time I will address professionalism. This is at the heart of almost all the cases that we see. One aspect is with documentation of medications, waste, treatments given and change of condition. If it is not documented, it is assumed that it did not happen. Documentation protects you. This is especially true for difficult patient interactions. We will move quickly to intervene and discipline nurses who are reported to us and investigated. Staying professional and maintaining good documentation and good communication will often keep nurses out of trouble. Also, remember that you must report any conviction to the Board of Nursing within 48 hours.

   The Nurse Licensure Compact now has 38 states with more states currently in the legislative process. For more information you can go the NCSBN nurse compact website: https://www.ncsbn.org/nurse-licensure-compact.htm

   The Board of Nursing meetings are always open to the public and we value your input. We have several new board members that will have their introductions in this newsletter. We welcome them and I look forward to working with them soon.

   I am proud to be working for all nurses in Wisconsin. I am seeing great care being given even with staffing shortages and the difficulties of the pandemic. Please take care of yourselves and your coworkers. Stay safe and stay professional!!

By: Janice Edelstein,
Registered Nurse Member

   The NCSBN Annual meeting was held August 18 and 19 through a virtual platform from Chicago. The keynote presentation was delivered by Doris Kearns Goodwin (Presidential historian) reminding us that we don’t know the history of COVID- we are in the middle of it. Similarities were identified throughout history as to the concerns of today, infectious disease, economy, and civil rights movement. With the extraordinarily quick develop-ment of the vaccines, our challenge is to encourage all Americans to get vaccinated. Based on her research of American Presidents, she identified 10 characteristics of leadership with empathy being the most critical. Other presenters included Elizabeth Iro, Chief Nursing Officer for WHO, addressing the importance of governance and data analysis during COVID, and Alison Rooth, International Nurse Regulator Collaborative (INRC), addressing findings of “The mobility project” identifying similarity, expectations, and regulation of international basic nursing in education and practice.

   Elections took place to fill the various positions for leadership committees of the organization. Approval of the revisions to the NCSBN Model Practice Act and Rules and the Next Generation NCLEX (NGN) test design and polytomous scoring methods both passed. With polytomous scoring partial credit can be given if an answer is correct on a multiple option question. Note that the Model Practice Act recommendations are related to best practice and what the literature recommends. A few considerations are related to the use of patient diagnosis, which is more interdisciplinary than nursing diagnosis, explaining telehealth to address where the patient is not where the practitioner is, LPN assessments to compliment RN assessments, and clarifying nurse by licensure not academic degree. These are recommendations with the purpose of developing a template for best practice.

NCSBN Business Book: 2021 NCSBN Annual Meeting – Business Book

Other Resource: NCSBN Tip of the Week

By: Rosemary P. Dolatowski, MSN, RN
      Director of School Health Services (Retired)
      Burlington Area School District

Favorite Aspect:

School Nursing is Challenging, Fun, Never Boring and Always learning.

   Challenging: School Nursing is an independent practice where the School RN (SRN) is often the only medical professional in the school or district. The role of the SRN is to reduce or eliminate barriers to education for ALL students.

   Fun: The SRN works with children from the age of 3-21. It allows you to develop a long-term relationship with children to watch them grow, develop, and succeed. The SRN plays an important role in that success for the medically involved or fragile students. Teaching a variety of health topics in the classrooms is another enjoyable aspect. This opens the door to establishing other connections with staff and students.

   Never Boring: You are working with children from the age of 3-21! They come to school with a variety of health conditions, some acute many chronic. The SRN must plan with staff for the student to succeed in an educational setting. The SRN educates staff to work with children with health conditions (diabetes, seizures, asthma etc…) and teaches students about disease management and positive health habits.

   Learning: The educational setting is completely different from a clinical setting. The SRN must be the medical generalist and then become the expert on school issues. Learning all the acronyms and how to navigate the children through these different arenas with their specific health issues is both challenging and rewarding. It is a constant learning environment. Love it.

Most Challenging Aspect:

Being pulled in many directions at one time and utilizing unlicensed personnel to provide procedures and care.

   Many Directions at once:  I think the most challenging aspect of school nursing in Wisconsin is being pulled in so many different directions at once. In Wisconsin the RN is most often the ONLY health care professional for an entire school district. It is difficult to have any type of a set schedule.

I was the Director of Health Services in a rural town and provided service for 8 schools, a student population of 3,400 and 300 staff members. One Fall having 3 kindergarten students with Diabetes in 3 different elementary schools all needing insulin at the same time is a challenge.

   Training Unlicensed personnel:

   The SRN must train and rely on unlicensed staff to provide some procedures (e.g., insulin admin). This can be scary, and the SRN must gain the trust of the parent that their child will be safe in the school setting.

   It is a very challenging, independent, and rewarding practice but it is one I loved and would encourage nurses to embrace.

By Vera Guyton, LPN

   Vera Guyon, LPN, has nearly 25 years in the nursing field in gerontology, hospice, home health, specialty and clinical nursing. A Joiner, Arkansas native, she is fortunate to have started her nursing career in Madison, Wisconsin where she currently works at the Madison West VA Clinic providing optimum care while serving with honor the men and women veterans.

   Vera received her LPN license at Madison Area Technical College and a gerontology certification specializing in providing optimum care and knowledge of the aging process to geriatric patients.

   Vera also finds passion in caring for others outside of the nursing field. She serves in The Women’s Ministry at her church, Madison Pentecostal Assembly in Madison Wi, encouraging women to build healthy relationships in love and unity within their lives for spiritual growth. With an expressed honor and appreciation to be elected as a professional member to the Wisconsin Board of Nursing, Vera is excited to serve the nurses and continue to promote the health and well-being of Wisconsin’s citizens, family, and friends.

By Linda Scott, PhD, RN, NEA-BC, FNAP, FAAN

   Linda Scott, PhD, RN, NEA-BC, FNAP, FAAN, is the dean of the University of Wisconsin—Madison School of Nursing, a position she has held since July 2016. Her previous academic nurse leadership roles included serving as Associate Dean in the College of Nursing at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and at the Kirkhof College of Nursing at Grand Valley State University (MI).

   As Dean of the UW–Madison School of Nursing, Dr. Scott provides leadership in educating nurses for the future of care, strengthening the school’s research enterprise, and forging partnerships to improve health outcomes for all. Throughout her academic nursing career, she has developed and implemented programs focused on increasing the number of underrepresented students prepared to impact health as nurses through research, education, and practice. She has secured significant federal and private funding in support of programs that reduce barriers to nursing education and mitigate health disparities.

   Dr. Scott earned her PhD in nursing from the University of Michigan, her MSN degree from Grand Valley State, and her BSN degree from Michigan State University. Her research focuses on the impact of fatigue and sleep deprivation on both nurses and patients. She was honored with Grand Valley State’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 2013.

   Linda Scott is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing (2008) and the National Academies of Practice (2020), a member of the American Nurses Association, a member of Sigma Theta Tau, and associate editor for Nursing Outlook. She is honored to work with her colleagues on the Board of Nursing to help address the health needs of Wisconsin.

By Barbara Nichols, PhD (h), MS, RN, FAAN

   The Wisconsin Center for Nursing is pleased to discuss The National Academy of Medicine (NAM) report: The Future of Nursing 2020 – 2030: Charting a Path to Achieve Health Equity. The report identifies that nurses are key to achieving health equity over the next decade.

   The report has four key value messages, nine recommendations, and 55 action initiatives. Key among the value statements are the facts that Nursing is the largest and most trusted health profession and thus has the ability to deal with health inequities; the most salient health issue of our time.

   The report comes at a critical period when the Covid-19 pandemic has magnified and unearthed long-standing inequities in healthcare with the corresponding insistence to transform every aspect of healthcare. 

   In the next decade nurses will face such demands as caring for an aging population responding to increased behavioral and mental health conditions, conducting research, and helping shape healthcare policy.

   The report posits that further leveraging the nursing workforce is key to improving health, health equity, and well-being for all.

   The full report can be found here: https://wicenterfornursing.org/wisconsin-nursing-workforce/other-workforce-reports/. In future issues the recommendations in this report will be discussed in more detail.