Accreditation as a lever for change in the development of the collaborative practitioner in the Australian health system.

Objective Patient expectations in the Australian healthcare system are for coordinated, collaborative practice. There is a need for education institutions, health services, accreditation authorities, and consumers to work together to achieve this goal. As part of a larger body of work, we sought to understand how these stakeholders contribute to the development of collaborative healthcare practice.

Is the Australian nursing workforce ready to embrace prescribing under supervision? A cross-sectional survey.

Aim: The aim was to explore nurses' preparedness to expand their practice to prescribe medicines under a supervision model.

Design: This was a cross-sectional study.

Methods: A convenience sample of Australian nurses recruited from memberships of State-based Nursing and Midwifery Unions and professional bodies from diverse care settings.

Evidence-informed implementation of nurse prescribing under supervision: An integrative review.

Aim: To explore evidence reporting facilitators and barriers to implementation of nurse prescribing and provide practical recommendations for evidence-informed implementation and adoption of nurse prescribing under a supervision model.

Background: As demand for access to quality health care services increases, health professional roles are expanding to meet population needs. Nurse prescribing has been effective in some countries and is being considered globally to address growing health care demand.

Teaching the principles of safe prescribing to a mixed profession postgraduate cohort: program development.

Background: Prescribing medicines is a complex task. A robust prerequisite curriculum that enables the efficient and consistent training of safe and effective prescribers is important. Despite differing prescribing contexts and professional attributes, the core elements of safe and effective prescribing relevant to all prescribers can be identified.

What does advanced practice mean to Australian paediatric pharmacists? A focus group study.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to explore perceptions and attitudes of Australian paediatric pharmacists about advanced pharmacy practice and to identify suitable methods of assessment for this level of practice.

Methods: Four focus groups (with 31 participants) were held in 2012 with Australian hospital pharmacists who work with children. Written notes and audio recordings were used to produce verbatim transcriptions and extract themes.

Use of a general level framework to facilitate performance improvement in hospital pharmacists in Singapore.

Objective: To evaluate the acceptability and validity of an adapted version of the General Level Framework (GLF) as a tool to facilitate and evaluate performance development in general pharmacist practitioners (those with less than 3 years of experience) in a Singapore hospital.

Method: Observational evaluations during daily clinical activities were prospectively recorded for 35 pharmacists using the GLF at 2 time points over an average of 9 months. Feedback was provided to the pharmacists and then individualized learning plans were formulated.