AONE president addresses national forum on future of nursing

American Organization of Nurse Executives President Donna Herrin-Griffith testified late yesterday at the first of three national forums to be convened by the Initiative on the Future of Nursing, an Institute of Medicine and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation project to address nursing challenges and solutions to improving health care. In her remarks, Herrin-Griffith highlighted the executive competencies required of the professional nurse; the AONE view of future patient care delivery; the role the practice environment plays in patient outcomes and professionalism; and the value of nursing to achieving quality, safe, patient-centered, accessible and affordable care. For example, AONE has been leading the dissemination of lessons learned from the Transforming Care at the Bedside program, initiated by the RWJF and Institute for Healthcare Improvement in 2003. "Through TCAB acute-care nurses at the unit level are able to institute changes at the point of care that then have resulted in improved patient care and nursing practice outcomes," she said. Hosted by Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, the forum focused on nursing in acute-care settings. AONE is an AHA subsidiary.