Martha Craft-Rosenberg

An international methodology to describe clinical nursing phenomena: a team approach.

The development of a structured and standardized clinical language for nursing is of major importance to the profession for both practice and science. This paper describes a methodological approach which has been developed for the refinement and extension of the NANDA taxonomy in the Nursing Diagnosis Extension and Classification (NDEC) project. The paper proposes that this method could be used by nurses in all countries to facilitate the identification, development and validation of terms and labels which can be incorporated into each countrys own emerging data systems, translated and cross mapped between systems, and eventually incorporated into international data sets.

Family-centered care: Practice and preparation

Although family-centered care is an expectation empirical data describing its use in practice or the extent to which practitioners are prepared to practice it are minimal. The purpose of this project was to describe views of family-centered practice reported by practitioners serving children. Health care practitioners serving children in 1 state were invited to a conference to discuss family-centered care and to assess their perceptions about its use and their practice preparation. Participants (N = 76) discussed family-centered care, opportunities and obstacles for its practice, and improvements for preparation. Findings from questionnaires and focus groups showed that most participants adhered to family-centered concepts and a subsample (n = 28) showed an increased use with a mean of 7.36 Likert gain scores on posttest following the conference. Suggestions for educators are offered.