Implementation of the IOM Future of Nursing Essay

Nursing is an important branch of healthcare because it plays a supportive role. Even though most nurses have limited skills, training, and experiences, they play important roles that allow healthcare facilities to operate smoothly (Halstead 2010). Therefore, their contributions in providing healthcare services cannot be ignored. Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative is a reputable committee that researched various issues affecting nursing. This essay explores various issues presented in the work of this committee.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative Committee and the IOM Report
This committee was established to research the working conditions of nurses as well as the way to improve them to ensure they offer good services. Many nations including the U.S.A. have experienced serious challenges in providing good healthcare services to their citizens (Institute of Medicine 2011).

In addition, this challenge continues to trouble nations even though they invest a lot of resources in solving them. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative got world recognition when it was mandated to conduct research and report about various issues, affecting nurses. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) was mandated to work with this committee to conduct research and give their report about the challenges nursing and present recommendations face to solve them.

These bodies were supposed to offer solutions to the problems that they would highlight during their research to ensure they are solved (Mason 2011). They worked together to ensure that they had identified all issues that affected nurses and their environment. This was motivated by the need to improve the existing conditions where nurses offered poor services to their clients.

In addition, the increase of the population, changes in technology made it difficult for nurses to deliver their duties well. This means that these challenges kept changing and while nurses continued to work under the same conditions and using old technology and skills (Institute of Medicine 2011).

This committee was supposed to research the problems associated with the training and education of nurses, availability, and quality of health insurance covers and licenses, remuneration, and allowances given to nurses (Valiga 2012). Therefore, it had a huge task of analyzing the conditions that prevailed at that time and which influenced the provision of services by nurses.

The Importance of the Report
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative Committee presented its report to the Department of Health (DOH), which gave highlighted some issues regarding the challenges that nurses faced during their services. In addition, it presented recommendations on how to improve this profession to ensure people get quality services (Institute of Medicine 2011). The report also considered the need to address the problems that nurses had to face; it also offered solutions to the challenges that hindered nurses from offering good services to their clients. It as well identified four issues that played significant roles in determining the future of nursing.

First of all, it focused on the need to restructure nursing and make sure the role of nurses was understood to reflect the needs of healthcare. It was noted that there were major conflicts regarding the role of nurses in healthcare institutions. Most doctors delegated most of their duties to nurses without drawing the boundary between the responsibilities of these departments (Institute of Medicine 2011). In addition, it was necessary to identify and outline the role of nurses in the provision of healthcare services. There was the need to give nurses additional roles to ensure they are actively involved in providing their services to the population (Valiga 2012). This was a good way of making use of their talents, skills, and experiences.

The committee highlighted the need to increase the number of training institutions to increase the number of nurses in the country. It was also observed that there were very few training centers meaning that few nurses were graduating. This was not proportional to the demands of the facilities that required additional nurses to manage their whole range of services (Institute of Medicine 2011). The committee proposed that the state should establish a lot of nurse training institutions to offer training to many students.

In addition, these centers were to be equipped with modern equipment and use curriculums that reflect the present and future demands of nursing. It appreciated the responsibilities of nurses in and promoting efficiency in providing healthcare services (Institute of Medicine 2011). However, it identified the need to train nurses to adapt to the changes that were regularly experienced while offering their services. It also noted that nurses required innovative solutions to manage the many problems facing this profession.

Finally, it was highlighted that there was an increase in the number of nurses and other health-related professionals who changed their careers from that of nursing to others. This indicated that there were going to be few nurses since most students changed their careers from nursing to teaching or management (Institute of Medicine 2011). Therefore, this was a serious future challenge that would cripple this profession and put the lives of many people at risk. The report explained that there was no motivation and incentives to retain nurses and encourage more students to pursue this training.

The Objectives of the Future of Nursing Campaign for Action
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Initiative and the AARP group established this campaign to encourage people to demand reforms in nursing (Institute of Medicine 2011). This action is aimed at ensuring the government adopts its report as a way of improving nursing. In addition, these players wanted to ensure that previous reports and recommendations were used to promote the efficiency of healthcare institutions.

The Basis of the State-Based Action Coalition
State-based action coalitions were aimed at ensuring the the reports presented to them. There were differences in the degree of these challenges, depending on the state (Mason 2011). Therefore, there was the need to address these challenges according to their presentations in different regions.

The state of California demanded the immediate removal of professional obstacles that prevented nurses from starting their training after graduating. This action ensured that nurses were recruited immediately after completing and passing their examinations (Mason 2011). In addition, it highlighted the need for residency plans to ensure nurses are close to each other to promote community nursing, and distance between nurses, healthcare facilities, and patients.