Standardized nursing care plan: a case study on developing a tool for clinical research.

The National Institutes of Health have developed a new organizational consortium through a funding mechanism called the Clinical and Translational Science Award. This program funds academic institutions to create a platform for research that expedites the development and delivery of new treatments through open interdisciplinary collaboration. As a result, the adult clinical research center at San Francisco General Hospital is now part of the Clinical and Translational Science Institute at the University of California San Francisco. Nurses on this research unit have begun to employ a standardized nursing care plan that focuses on the particular needs of the research participant, an advancement that if implemented nationwide among all adult clinical research centers will be of paramount importance in fostering a collaborative relationship within the new organizational structure. This standardized nursing care plan will provide research nurses with a tool that will enable them to provide safe and quality patient care.