Attendance at the Health Care Conferences UK
21st Feb 2020
BACCN have an agreement with HCUK events for two BACCN members to attend events. Karin Gerber and Andrea Turner attended A Practical guide to Demonstrating and Improving Nurse Prescribing Competence and Practice which took place on the 31st January 2020.
Please find their reports below:
Karin Gerber: Advanced Nurse Practitioner, Critical Care Outreach
"I qualified as a independent prescribing practitioner as part of my role within Critical Care Outreach more than 10 years ago and it has had a significant impact on my practice and those of my colleagues. We've been able to share our work and the impact it has had through publishing our data within Nursing in Critical Care as well as presenting at various Critical Care Nursing conferences since then (Wilson et al, 2012; Wilson, 2018). This work identified the vital importance of continuing professional development but with ongoing cuts to funds available to practitioners it's becoming more and more difficult to undertake.
The BACCN recognise how difficult it sometimes is to obtain funding and has collaborated with HealthCare Conferences UK to provide some free and or discounted places to study events (https://www.baccn.org/events/ ) as part of BACCN Membership benefits and this included the "A practical guide to demonstrating & improving prescribing competence & practice" day that took place in London at the of January. Late last year a colleague and I applied for the 2 free places and were very lucky to hear that we've been successful - so off we went to the BIG SMOKE on a cold winter's day towards the end of January.
This was a great day that was chaired by Professor Angela Alexander (School of Pharmacy, University of Reading) somewhat of a coincidence as both work in Reading at the Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust. For my part as an experienced prescriber I found the sessions on the new competency framework for designated prescribing practitioners very exciting as this will hopefully lead to some of the first nurse designated prescribing practitioners - again breaking barriers!! The day also covered a session on pain management, something else I'm very passionate about.
I would encourage all BACCN members to visit the website to see which sessions you can benefit from and take up the opportunity as part of your membership” #workingandlearningtogether
Andrea Turner: Clinical Nurse Specialist, Critical Care Outreach
“I was lucky enough to secure a BACCN-sponsored place for this conference. As a nurse prescriber for 5yrs now, I was interested to learn some developments at the forefront of prescribing thinking.
Katherine Hall’s session on the updated nursing framework was valuable. The thinking behind the update seems more streamlined, enabling a prescriber to use the framework at the forefront of their decision making. I particularly liked the acknowledgement of, and more emphasis on, de-prescribing as a valid prescribing decision, plus the inclusion of challenges associated with remote prescribing.
The concept of DPP was not entirely new but I had been under the impression it was more geared to Advanced Clinical Practitioners than “little old me”. It was thought-provoking to learn that an experienced prescriber was considered to have 3 years active prescribing experience! There was good discussion regarding the pressures and limitations of the role following Angela Alexander’s session, particularly on ensuring that the DPP should be appropriate for the prescribing student’s role: the diversity of the delegates at the conference were a good reflection of prescribers nationally and the need for consistency in competency of all healthcare professionals.
As part of completing my nursing revalidation, I strive to ensure that 2 of my reflections are prescribing-focused as these can provide exceptional opportunities for learning. Claire Callaghan’s interactive sessions enabled me to place myself within the DPP spectrum, which provided a surprising evaluation of my own skill set and suitability to become a DPP if required! The exercise had the additional bonus of dovetailing into portfolio reflections.
Attendance at this conference afforded me the opportunity to enhance my care and knowledge further, particularly focusing on an updated approach to the competency framework tool to ensure my patient-focused practise continues to be knowledgeable, safe, effective and the best that it can be. We can and should use these tools to prove our worth”
The venue was great, the day well organised, and a lovely lunch and networking opportunity enjoyed by all. Thank you BACCN!
References:
Wilson, M., Gerber, K., Mahoney, S. and Odell, M. (2012). An audit of independent nurse prescribing in a critical care outreach team. Nursing in Critical Care 17 (2), pp.83-89.
Wilson M (2018) A 5-year retrospective audit of prescribing by a Critical Care Outreach Team. Nursing in Critical Care;23(3):121-12