Wednesday, June 26, 2019

Seminar: How nursing organizations are leveraging their privilege to resist concentration camps












Text Version

NU001 - Seminar: How nursing organizations are leveraging their privilege and #DontLookAway

An exploration of how nursing organizations are using resources, mobilizing members, and taking action to resist the U.S. government policy towards families fleeing horror and seeking asylum of separating and placing them in concentration camps. Nursing organizations will be contacted by member and non-member nurses to learn their response to this humanitarian crisis.

Passing grades

D - The organization promotes #Lights4Liberty with pinned Tweets, website embeds, statements of support from leadership with outreach & PR, and specific emails to members. It’s the least effort required to pass.

C - The organizations contributes money and service to three organizations: #Lights4Liberty, @RaicesTexas, and (ideas? ACLU, others on the ground?); and promotes fundraising and other support by acting as a link or channel for its members. Because money is easy with privilege but spending it requires thought, effort, and even hurts a little bit maybe. Also meets requirements for D.

B - The organization develops, promotes, and distributes information, materials, programs, etc. that describe how #Lights4Liberty relates to the organization’s specific mission (toxic stress, emergency/triage, maternal child health, public health, the role of advanced practice nurses, bedside care and supervision, etc.). Also meets requirements for D, CNice work. Keep it up.

A - Everything for D, C, and B, PLUS the organization co-sponsors, participates in, or otherwise supports a specific #Lights4Liberty event as the start of an ongoing focus on this topic and related ones as proof of its belief that nursing is political action and intelligent care. That’s some leveraging! People are paying attention. Keep walking the walk.

Non-passing grades (not including orgs not contacted - N/C)

IgNon - Ignored, no replies to contacts: (list).

DecNo - Replied, declined to talk, no reason given: (respondent/role).

DecBec - Replied, declined to talk because: (reason, respondent/role).

Nope - Org says it wont do anything: (reason, respondent/role).

WTAF?!?* - Org supports separating families and putting them in concentration camps.

*see also IgNon, DecNo, DecBec, and Nope.

Required viewing


Cizik School of Nursing Published on Feb 24, 2017, “a REMI Platinum Award-winning documentary film that tells the grim cautionary tale of nurses who participated in the Holocaust and abandoned their professional ethics during the Nazi era. The 56-minute film, Caring Corrupted: the Killing Nurses of the Third Reich, casts a harsh light on nurses who used their professional skills to murder the handicapped, mentally ill and infirm at the behest of the Third Reich and directly participated in genocide.”   Watch on YouTube   

Dedicated to the Life & Memory of Robert Cizik
April 4, 1931 – June 4, 2019
With Love and Respect



More to follow...

Wednesday, June 12, 2019

Another friend I've never met - in person


I first met Leslie Kernisan, MD, MPH online several years ago through her blog GeriTech, where she writes about technology and geriatric care. Leslie is board-certified in geriatric and internal medicine, with a practice in San Francisco focused on aging adults living at home and supporting their family and formal caregivers.

She developed a comprehensive set of online resources for clinicians, caregivers, and the public that have since evolved into Better Health While Aging providing, “practical information for aging health and family caregivers.”

The content is free, with in-depth features and podcasts on the wide range of topics we're likely to encounter on our trajectory towards end of life  - hospital delirium, cognitive decline, staying safe from falls, etc. 

Leslie recently launched a subscription-based online membership community to support those caring for aging parents called, Helping Older Parents (HOP)

I joined for a few months. My own parents are long gone, but I signed up to get a sense of how such a community could work. Unlike the informal peer-support of public and private online groups, HOP provides access to clinical guidance in the context of an established professional medical practice.

I cancelled my membership after a few months, but only because I wasn’t taking advantage of the support it provides. 

I’m very comfortable recommending Leslie’s work here, and expect that some of you will find great value in the content she has developed, and in the membership community.

Monday, June 10, 2019

Please make it stop...

You don't want to see the next slide.

I wrote this after completing a one-hour online continuing education program on the topic of Advance Care Planning (ACP), provided by a nursing professional organization:

"The content is important, the presenter is proficient, but the format is awful - narrated slides. Ugh. 

Trying to teach in that format is like trying to juggle while wearing handcuffs. 

The narration often matched the slide, word for word, and the presenter seemed to be getting tired towards the end. 

I know you can do better, and we (learners) deserve better. Seriously. 

The three video clips are a good start towards better, though the roll plays were kind of stiff and the miraculous turn with the old couple was a bit contrived, still good for trying, so keep it up. 

Probably the most interesting new thing that I learned from this program is the term, "New Jersey-ite."

What will I do in my practice after completing this program?

I will review the 3-minute video clip on YouTube featuring Atul Gawande talking about how to have a difficult conversation with a patient and family, presented several years ago at the New Yorker Festival. Check it out."


Monday, June 3, 2019

A comparison of hospitalization vs hospice


"Thumbs up!" optional.