4 Ways to Build Innovative Ideas into Nursing Practice

Nurses play important roles in all health care access points from hospitals and physicians’ offices to community health centers, school health clinics, nursing homes, and public health departments. Since their roles in patient care across the health system provide significant opportunities to affect health outcomes, nurses at all levels need to open up to new ways of thinking and working to have the confidence and skills to create new ideas and nursing interventions to work on specific issues beyond their typical responsibilities. Here are a few examples of nurses’ innovative thinking: creating a predictive model to prevent hospital readmission by Laura Beth Brown, MSN, RN, president of Vanderbilt Home Care Services; and making pillowcases for patients with cognitive impairments to decrease patient restraint by Jan Bahle, MSN, CNS, and her team at University Hospitals Portage Medical Center in Ravenna, OH.