In today’s economies, getting funds to support an issue as a nurse is not easy. It, therefore, leaves one with limited options. One of them is facing the government or legislators who can offer financial assistance or influence certain legislation. Lobbying, that is a procedure of collecting information and giving it to legislators, who can be requested to provide help in issues that they can help. The central goal of lobbying is to win a promise to help your interests. Other than getting support, one can develop a relationship that enables you to cooperate in the coming years. It's imperative not to cut off any ties as you chip away at an issue since no one knows what challenges or opportunities tomorrow brings.
How to Lobby Legislators or Local Government for Funds
As it is right now, the Diversion program under the Board of Registered Nurse (BRN) is very expensive since the organization is profit based. When thinking of funds which can be used to accomplish projects especially in nursing, legislators are the best. Through lobbying, one can obtain his objectives since legislators tend to listen more than anyone especially when their term in office is almost coming to an end. The following are the tricks of lobbying.
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Present yourself before legislators are occupied. Legislators have specific periods of convening to the state assembly. Before they become occupied, an influential nurse can make a call to the legislator’s office and request a schedule so as to plan for a meeting. If in the event that a nurse is ok with the one-on-one platform, he can ask for a half-hour meeting. Lay the preparation for any one-on-one experience by acclimating yourself with the legislator’s concentrate on a couple of issues ( Oneka et al., 2017 ). It is advisable to critically understand the legislator you are about to face. This is because some of them are well connected to other organizations or groups that can offer substantial assistance. What you ought to consider is the possibility of being heated up by some politicians. Above all, the nurse must be honest and fair about the effect of impaired nurse and the effect has on the medical practice.
The nurse must be clear on his or her goal. Before the nurse begins the lobbying plans, he or must be clear on what they want to achieve. Addiction among the medical practice is a challenge and there are so many ways to approach the problem. If the nurse wants to approach the legislators so that they can put pressure on BRN to convert the process of diversion to a non-profit organization, he must stick to it. It is well understood that legislators can lobby a number of issues but this happens with a certain order. When the goal is clear, it is easier to be understood and acted upon as soon as possible. One thing about legislators they are always willing to listen to issues especially those coming from their constituencies since it counts to their votes ( Oneka et al., 2017 ).
Always keep the message short. Most meetings that involve legislators must always be kept short. This is because legislators are busy people and they are prone to all forms disruptions including unexpected guests, phone calls or emergencies. The messages should be delivered within the first ten minutes of the meeting. This allows the nurse to pass the message before any interruptions cut short the meeting.
Know the person you are about to approach. Not everyone can support medical issues, especially when it involves addiction and drug abuse. Some legislators may have issues to do with drugs. It is, therefore, imperative to do a little research on the legislator you have identified and see how helpful he has been especially at the national debate he has been involved in. Much of the information is found on the internet (Kunyk, 2015). It only takes a few minutes to find out the truth about the person you are presenting the issue and how helpful they can be rather than presenting the issue into the wrong and unhelpful hands that can frustrate you in the long run.
Never go off message. The moment you decide to take up the issue, so many people are now at your back. Those nurses who are affected or who are about to be affected anchor their faith in you particularly those who cannot afford to lose their job or pay for the Diversion program. If you go off or give-up, you will hurt so many people who look up to you. Sometimes, the lobbying process can be tiresome. All that is needed is a constant follow-up to remind the legislators over the issue and staying focused ( Oneka et al., 2017 ).
Follow the issue as soon as possible. After presenting the issue, it is time to make a follow-up. The only way to achieve this is by sending an email to the legislator in order to on confirm the progress. Another way this can be done is by preparing another meeting with a proper follow-up to personally assess the progress of the issue. The nurse can finally end up with thanking the legislator.
Disciplinary Actions towards Impaired Nurses
Different states in the U.S have several regulations in addition to those provided by the Federal government regarding nurses who use alcohol and drugs. Actually, all states are required to report all health practitioners who they suspect to be impaired. Furthermore, unprofessional conduct depicted by a nurse, physician or allied health professional must be reported. This is not limited to those who engage in the possession, distribution or sale of controlled substances as stipulated in chapter 893, for other reasons (Kunyk, 2015).
Why I chose the Impaired Nurse issue
I chose this topic because it is a problem affecting the patients’ wellbeing and the nurses themselves. Smith (2012) reveals that the impaired nurse pose an ethical dilemma to nurse managers. It seems incompatible for nurse managers to support impaired nurses and guarantee that patients are receiving quality care and they are safe. It is easier for other employees who have an addiction to be treated normally and assisted back to their former employment. But it is different for nurses because they present a number of symptoms that if not reported, it can jeopardize the well-being of patients and to them too. Examples of the noticeable symptoms of an impaired health practitioner include dishonesty, arriving to work late and leaving early, documentation errors, constant mistakes, mood changes, unusual wasted opioids, more seek leaves, elevated opioids sign-outs, and high dosage of pain medications. A nurse who is struggling with an addiction is in a dilemma of reporting his or her addiction simply because they are at high risk of losing their license, their peers and even their jobs. At times nurses question who might trust them if reveal that they are addicted.
According to Caroselli and Zboray (2016), the impaired nurse has been presented severally on movies, television and by the press. As much as nurses are a hundred percent dedicated to their patients, it has been revealed that 15 percent of them have impaired performance as a result of substance abuse. It has also been discovered that health professionals who use alcohol and other drugs go a step further to diagnose and treat themselves. Due to reprisal, even colleagues fear to report this. At the same time, patients are also uncomfortable to take action against nurses who are responsible for their care. In clinical judgment and performance, lapses are normally late signs of impairment, making diagnosis hard until the nurse acknowledges that he or she has a problem.
The impaired nurse has become a normal occurrence in the real life of the health care community. Currently, the debates on how the nursing profession needs to tackle the problem have become controversial. Although the Board of Registered Nurse (BRN) recommends the Diversion Program, it has been discovered that the program is expensive, and a nurse needs to stay away from work for some time and a lawyer is required to protect the license of a nurse.
The topic has drawn the attention of many nurses and other stakeholders. This is due to BRN’s stand that if an impaired nurse desires to keep his or her license, then he or she must pay and join the diversion program. This topic is worth it because the board also insists that any nurse who diverts controlled medications from where they work, they should be handled in a similar way as those nurses who have the disease of alcoholism or addiction ( Smith, 2012) .
The Relevance of the Topic
There is succinct Evidence-Based Research on the impaired nurse. This is because nurses are usually afraid to come forward to report their problems. Similarly, several administrations seem to hide the data on impaired nurses because they don’t want their healthcare facilities to be associated with addicted nurses. The best way to ensure that BRN helps as many impaired nurses as possible is to lobby the government to pile pressure on the organizations so that it makes Diversion a non-profit organization. The nurse can also lobby to enable hospitals to intervene in the impaired nurse problem without necessarily reporting them. This will ensure that the working terms of nurses are not affected. If nurses can be assured that they can get or ask for help from EAP, peers, or non-governmental programs before the addiction becomes a major problem to their job and without being reported to BRN, most of them are likely to report their addiction on time (Kunyk, 2015).
Information about the impaired nurse can be used in different ways in the clinical setting. This includes the treatment of addiction and substance use. Through this information, impaired nurses can get a good opportunity for successful recovery. If treated, the health, social and occupational well-being of nurses can be improved. This information can help in providing alternative treatment options rather than sudden termination. Instead of waiting to be abused by family members, co-nurses, friends, and peers, and even lose their jobs, Smith (2012) suggests that information provided by the impaired nurses’ help to land them in different structured treatment programs that might be successful and help them to reenter the nursing profession again.
In conclusion, social astuteness, interpersonal skill ability to network and to be sincere are the traits that nurses who have influence at the national level must possess in order to lobby successfully. All intended goals of the nurse must be supported with evidence-based research. If one wants to lobby his legislature or government for the Impaired Nurse issue, he or she must present the issue as short as possible, presents the issue before the legislator incurs with other issues, show some clarity when presenting the issue, never go off message, make constant follow-up and know the legislator you are about to follow. All these activities can help a nurse to present the issue and assists colleagues with challenges.
References
Caroselli-Karinja, M. F., & Zboray, S. D. (2016). The impaired nurse. Journal of psychosocial nursing and mental health services , 24 (6), 14-19.
Kunyk, D. (2015). Substance use disorders among registered nurses: prevalence, risks and perceptions in a disciplinary jurisdiction. Journal Of Nursing Management , 23 (1), 54-64. doi:10.1111/jonm.12081
Oneka, G., Shahidi, F. V., Muntaner, C., Bayoumi, A. M., Mahabir, D. F., Freiler, A., ... & Shankardass, K. (2017). A glossary of terms for understanding political aspects in the implementation of Health in All Policies (HiAP). J Epidemiol Community Health , 71 (8), 835-838.
Smith, G. B. (2012). Attitudes of nurse managers and assistant nurse managers toward chemically impaired colleagues. Image: the Journal of Nursing Scholarship , 24 (4), 295-300.
