In my last blog on the 19th February 13 I described how my diagnosed sciatica led to an MRI and consequently the identification of a substantial prolapsed disc at L5-S1.At the time I was awaiting a surgical appointment with a view to possible lumbar discectomy but I was aware of the controversy surrounding the efficacy […]
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Sharing decisions with patients: Small things do matter
I am not a paediatric nurse but as a parent I sometimes have opportunities to admire the skill of paediatric nurses who make a difference in the lives of children and their families, by putting young patients at the centre of decisions about their healthcare. It was during a hospital visit with a family member […]
Context Matters: Factors that Promote Knowledge Exchange
For someone my age, learning to communicate via a blog or tweeting is a steep curve. My five-year old granddaughter is more adept at downloading apps and searching the internet than I. Besides age, I’m also discovering other important factors that influence knowledge exchange through my research in northern Canada. The context of a health […]
RCN 2013 International Nursing Research Conference Belfast
Some reflections from Suzanne Watts, this year’s Marjorie Simpson New Researcher Award winner I suspect that the 2013 RCN International Research Conference will be remembered by the delegates for two things. The first being the breadth and scope of the outstanding presentations and the second the weather. For some of the delegates the blizzard conditions […]
Patient-centred care: harmonising patients and professionals perspectives
Last week I was debating with a group of second year pre-registration child field of practice nursing students what concepts such as ‘family-centred care’ and ‘patient-centeredness’ meant to them and how these concepts informed their practice. Overwhelming the students felt these concepts were implicit when working with children, young people and families and a central […]
Narrative Practice
I heard an interesting lecture today. It was about narrative analysis. I won’t delve into detail about this qualitative analysis approach. Rather I would like to focus on the comment made by the professor who teaches medical students. He teaches ‘narrative medicine’. Narrative medicine occurs when a physician moves beyond simply attending to a patient’s […]
Challenges of incorporating evidence within clinical practice
I am passionate about developing nurses skills in relation to accessing and using the best available evidence to inform clinical decisions. Consequently, joining the editorial team at Evidence-Based Nursing was an exciting start to the year. New roles are often associated with a mix of emotions, from excitement to apprehension and having the skills to […]
Skills for evidence-based nursing
In the last few weeks, following the publication of the Francis report there has been a lot of discussion in the UK nursing press about why the nurses at Mid-Staffs did not whistle blow about the poor practice that was taking place in the hospital. We will probably never understand this completely but I think […]
A Call for the Return of Therapeutic Relationships
As I approach becoming an ‘older adult’, I’m increasingly worried. Although I am healthy and do not foresee needing acute care, home care, or long term care services in the near future, I do realize that needing these services will likely come sooner than I would like. This frightens me because of what my home […]
Sciatica update :(
The sciatica I described recently didn’t settle down. Instead it got worse and the pain intensified. I initially visited the physio and although the first session seemed to help the second two didn’t and the pain continued to a crescendo where walking was almost impossible and I required urgent medical intervention and IM analgesics. Eventually […]