Nurse practitioners' degrees and associations with time use, functional autonomy, and job outcomes.

BACKGROUND: Doctorate of Nursing Practice preparation is recommended for entry to nurse practitioner (NP) practice but there are few comparative studies, and their designs conflate educational pathways. PURPOSE: To investigate time use, functional autonomy, and job outcomes among NPs without a doctorate, NPs whose initial NP preparation and doctorate were separated by 2 or more years, and NPs whose NP preparation and doctorate were concurrent. METHOD: We selected all NPs from the 2018 National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses, except those whose doctorates focused on research. We controlled for confounding and applied sample weights to produce nationally representative results. DISCUSSION: NPs' educational pathways are associated with distinct practice roles and, moving forward, policy should be informed by evidence that accounts for their differences. CONCLUSION: Concurrent NPs had higher levels of functional autonomy compared with NPs without a doctorate, but patterns of time use were essentially the same. Separate doctoral education was associated with teaching and administration.

Leading as Servant in Times of Crisis.

ABSTRACT: Using servant leadership as a framework, leaders within a school of nursing guided faculty during the COVID-19 pandemic and called them to address social injustice in the summer of 2020. A model was developed to sustain growth and build resilience of students, faculty, and staff. Influenced by external and internal drivers that stimulated the need for change, strategies were implemented based on core principles of servant leadership. Outcomes emerged in three categories: collaborative strengths demonstrated by students, faculty, and staff; performance of the community to be intentional about change; and transformative practices leading to enhancement of internal and external partnerships.

A Thematic Synthesis of the Roles of Nurses at Safer Consumption Sites.

ABSTRACT: Opioid use, particularly via injection, is associated with an increased risk of infection, injury, and death. Safer consumption sites (SCSs), where people may consume previously obtained drugs under observation, have been shown to reduce these risks among people who use drugs. Most SCSs employ nurses, but there is limited research into their roles. The objective of this article is to describe and synthesize the roles of nurses at SCSs to better understand their importance in a rapidly proliferating public health intervention. We extracted data from 48 qualitative, quantitative, peer-reviewed, and gray literature, as well as primary source narrative articles on SCSs, whether they were explicitly about nursing or not. We coded each mention of nurses or nursing in each article and identified 11 descriptive themes or roles that SCS nurses carry out. From these, we identified the following three analytical themes or hypotheses about the character of these roles: (a) The primary aim of SCS nursing care is to reduce morbidity and mortality; (b) SCS nurses create a therapeutic community; and (c) SCS nurses engage in research, professional activities, and activism to better understand and promote SCSs. More research into the roles of SCS nurses is needed to better serve a vulnerable population.