NNPBC Blog

Nurses for Planetary Health: A Call to Action

Nurses for Planetary Health: A Call to Action Contributors: Barb Astle, PhD, RN; Lisa Bourque-Bearskin, PhD, RN; Dzifa Dordunoo, PhD, RN; Amanda Egert BSN, RN, MSN student; Rebecca Houweling, BScN, RN MSN student; Nicole Moen MSc, RN; Katrina Plamondon PhD, RN; Raluca Radu, BSN, RN, MSN student; Darlene Sanderson, PhD, RN; Catherine Smith, MSc, RN  Indigenous populations have inhabited the lands across the globe for tens of thousands of years.… Read More »Nurses for Planetary Health: A Call to Action

Why Nurses Care About the Charter Challenge: Standing Up Against the Threat to our Publicly Funded Health Care System

Why Nurses Care About the Charter Challenge: Standing Up Against the Threat to our Publicly Funded Health Care System by Sally Thorne, RN   BC nurses have been closely watching the case of Dr. Brian Day, CEO of the for-profit Cambie Surgeries Corporation, who has been challenging the constitutionality certain key provisions within our BC Medicare Protections Act, the Act that protects our health care system. His attempt to remove… Read More »Why Nurses Care About the Charter Challenge: Standing Up Against the Threat to our Publicly Funded Health Care System

Using Nursing Insights to Inform the MAiD Conversation

Using Nursing Insights to Inform the MAiD Conversation by Barb Pesut, RN Since federal legislation in June 2016 made Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) a legal health care option in Canada, patients and health care systems have been learning a lot about what this new practice implies, and what we need to know as a society to ensure that it is managed well. As of the most recent interim report,… Read More »Using Nursing Insights to Inform the MAiD Conversation

Breaking Down Healthcare Barriers for Transgender British Columbians

Breaking Down Healthcare Barriers for Transgender British Columbians by Zak Matieschyn, BSN, MN, RN, NP(Family) I am always amazed, and a bit shocked, when I think about how much the world has changed in the 20 years since I began my nursing career as a student at the University of Victoria. We were still in the early days of the Internet back then, and had no idea that two decades… Read More »Breaking Down Healthcare Barriers for Transgender British Columbians

After 10 Years, What's Next for Nurse Practitioners? by Mark Schultz, NP

The introduction of Nurse Practitioners in B.C has just recently passed the 10 year mark. Throughout this past decade, we have had some notable successes in NP integration - some large, some small. We're finally starting to see general acknowledgment by the Ministry of Health, the health authorities, and even some of our medical colleagues, that nurses with advanced practice education and the appropriate resources to support them can be… Read More »After 10 Years, What's Next for Nurse Practitioners? by Mark Schultz, NP

Being Poor is Expensive – Nursing Needs to Raise its Game, by Zak Matieschyn BSN, MN, RN, NP(Family)

I live in a great neighbourhood in an amazing little town in the Kootenays. I have a chubby cat. My wife and I have professional, high profile jobs that pay us well. I eat three (and ok, sometimes more) meals every single day and if I’m hungry, I jump in my car and head to the grocery store. I have decent clothes, a warm bed and good health. And I… Read More »Being Poor is Expensive – Nursing Needs to Raise its Game, by Zak Matieschyn BSN, MN, RN, NP(Family)

Tools of the Trade, by Lori Campbell, RN

If Michelle Collins and Joy Behar of The View have learned anything in the last two days, I hope it’s that their flippant comments were misinformed and hurtful – not to mention targeted to a group of professionals who have committed their lives, passion, knowledge and skills to caring for people just like them. If you haven’t seen it yet, these two hostesses of The View were commenting on Miss… Read More »Tools of the Trade, by Lori Campbell, RN

Self-Care in Nursing: A Call to Action, by Maren Austen, BSN Student

There is evidence that nurses know that we should take care of ourselves and how we should be doing it, yet there is still a gap between what is known and what is practiced (Malloy, et al.). As a profession centered on caring, nurses spend much of our time providing care for others; unfortunately, we often do not give the same consideration to self-care – those activities we do to… Read More »Self-Care in Nursing: A Call to Action, by Maren Austen, BSN Student

B.C.’s Flu Shot Policy for Healthcare Providers: it just makes sense, by Hannah Varto, NP

This year again the BC Ministry of Health has mandated that all healthcare providers must receive the influenza vaccine and if they choose not to, they must wear a mask for the duration of flu season whilst providing patient care. I applaud this decision and am frustrated by some of my colleagues who argue against science and common sense. Let’s examine some of the arguments. Point 1: Flu kills.  It… Read More »B.C.’s Flu Shot Policy for Healthcare Providers: it just makes sense, by Hannah Varto, NP

What do I walk with? by Wendy Bowles, NP

Listening to Kathy Bird, an icon in the world of Aboriginal Nursing in Canada and keynote speaker at the Winnipeg A.N.A.C. Conference, my attention was captured as she began talking about her lived experience - her history as an Aboriginal woman, both as a nurse and a medicine woman. She spoke of her "bundle" of medicine in almost the same breath as her past in residential school; these were the… Read More »What do I walk with? by Wendy Bowles, NP