A comparison of job descriptions for nurse practitioners working in out-of-hours primary care services: implications for workforce planning, patients and nursing.

Aims And Objectives: To compare and contrast job descriptions for nursing roles in out-of-hours services to obtain a general understanding of what is required for a nurse working in this job.

Background: Out-of-hours services provide nursing services to patients either through telephone or face-to-face contact in care centres. Many of these services are newly created giving job opportunities to nurses working in this area.

Using focus groups to explore the views of parents whose children are in hospital.

Parents of children in hospital were invited to attend focus group discussions to give their views on: the experience of attending hospital with their children; information provision; facilities; and relationships with staff. The aim of the study was to inform an action plan to identify good practice and improve aspects of service delivery identified as of concern to parents. Themes identified from recorded discussions of 15 parents in four sessions were categorised as: They should be listening to parents; Stress of staying with their child; Feeling safe; Waiting; Parents as partners in care.

Using quality of life assessment in wound care.

This article considers the role of the nurse in caring for patients who have wounds, drawing particular attention to the quality of life of these patients. For the purpose of this article a wound is defined as any break in skin integrity, caused by injury, infection or operation, which requires some form of nursing intervention to promote healing. A nursing approach is suggested that focuses nursing on the psychosocial and physical factors affecting wound care.

Workforce planning and community children's nurses: it's all in the advertisements.

This paper outlines a study exploring job advertisements for community children's nurses (CCNs). A post-structural approach was taken to illuminate the development of community children's nursing services (CCNS) and the profile of characteristics, skills and caseload within a workforce-planning context. An analysis of 100 advertisements looked at title, skills, caseload, qualifications and evolving roles.