Karnataka

‘Nursing has to evolve new paradigms’

START: President of Nursing Research Society of India Beena Rose inaugurating the 12th national conference of the society on ‘Action Research’ in Manipal on Monday.

Manipal: President of the Nursing Research Society of India (NRSI) Reena Bose said on Monday that nursing profession had to advance evolving new paradigms.

She was speaking after inaugurating the two-day 12th national conference of NRSI on “Action research: Bridging the gap between nursing knowledge and nursing practice”, organised by the Manipal College of Nursing, here.

Prof. Bose said that the healthcare scenario was changing. Although many infectious diseases had been eradicated, new ones were emerging. Changes in lifestyle had led to the emergence of new diseases. Some diseases were drug resistant. All these posed a formidable challenge to the nursing profession.

She said the new millennium had set up a new era of nursing knowledge and practice. Action research was one of the means through which nursing knowledge could be applied in new practices. Action research also led to evidence-based quality-care which was the aim of nursing profession. The responsibility and obligation of each professional nurse was to strive for better knowledge and skill. “Action research helps in transformation of knowledge into skill through which quality care can be rendered to the clients,” she said. Nurses had a general feeling that research was for writing thesis while doing M.Sc. in nursing. Nurses had not realised that research was necessary to improve quality of nursing care.

While carrying out research during nursing care, nurses had to observe thoroughly every step of nursing care, record it scientifically to facilitate analysis and then interpret it meaningfully. “Carrying out research along with nursing care will not hamper the quality or require extra time,” she said.

Nurses felt scared of statistics as they were not familiar with it, she said.

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