On the Job: What Really Works?

Volume 21, Number 4 Fall 2004

Editorial
First-Rate Work Environments by Kathy Schoonover-Shoffner
The editorial points toward what is being done to create favorable work environments that support nursing. God's Word points to standards and conditions that enhance workplace excellence. A glimpse of each article in the Fall 2004 is offered and readers are made aware of changes to the format and content of JCN.

Workplace Challenges
The Right Thing - For the Right Reason by Pam Price-Hoskins
Value systems seem distant from real-life nursing, yet our moral frameworks are lenses through which we view the world. Do you think humanistically or Christianly in the everyday tight spots of practice. Price-Hoskins applies the Code of Ethics for Nurses to these two ways of thinking.

Clinician-Assisted Suicide: Merciful Release or Unlawful Death? by Susan A. Salladay
Nurses are facing complex-ethical questions about end-of-life care and a patient's right to die a good death. Salladay explores how terms are often used to soften the issues. Many issues surrounding a patient's assumed right to die are not as straightforward as they seem to be. Christian nurses must understand the ethical and philosophical positions used to justify or deny the morality of clinician-assisted suicide or euthanasia.

Perfect Peace at Work? by Marilyn C. Anderson and Hilreth Lanig
Communication, conflicting values, envy and control issues are challenges to peace at work. Scripture offers suggestions for a peaceful mind: preparation, realistic expectations, priorities, disciplined language and consideration of one's life phase. The right focus allows peace to prevail.

The Nursing Shortage
Thinking Outside the Box: Rescue Nurses Lend a Hand by Joni McCollum
Read how two nurse-managers combined their units and brought in rescue nurses to help nursing colleagues. Rescue nurses are nurses to the nurse, allocating time and skills to ease the workload of nurses with full patient assignments. Discover how this retention and recruitment program has been successful.

An Effective Retention Strategy: Mentoring Like Jesus by Marcena Walker
Jesus worked one-on-one with his disciples. Walker suggests transferring that strategy to nursing through mentoring. She provides suggestions to employ in mentoring assignments.

So, What Is Mentoring? by Luberta (Skip) McDonald
McDonald, a nurse and life coach, shares how she was mentored as a young nurse and helps readers implement mentoring. Helpful questions for personal mentoring assessment are offered.

Precepting: Putting Myself in Her Shoes by Jill DeHoog
DeHoog recalls her experience precepting Billie Sue. When DeHoog learns to let go of her preconceptions about Billie, the real nurse in Billie begins to emerge.

Parish Nursing
Mobilize Support Groups to Meet Congregational Needs by Janice E. Hurley and Susanne Mohnkern
Hurley and Mohnkern believe that the church is the perfect place to offer psychosocial support groups, and that parish nurses are well equipped for the process. Suggestions for assessment and getting started are provided. Stages of group development--forming, storming, norming and performing--are outlined. Charts make this a valuable parish nurse research or practical article.

The Toilet Nurse by Karen Cavaleri
The first in a new department--Practicing, Cavaleri recounts her care of an elderly woman who called her the toilet nurse. She shares how she remembers God?s call to ministry in the midst of her nursing practice.

Gift-Bearers by Kristina Ibitayo
Thoughtful poem reminding nurses of God's work accomplished through their lives.