Rural emergency nurses face unique obstacles to providing quality end-of-life (EOL) care. Stories provided by emergency nurses embody their most difficult EOL care obstacles. METHODS A questionnaire was sent to 53 rural hospitals. Respondents were asked to share stories that epitomized the obstacles faced while providing EOL care in the rural emergency setting. RESULTS The lack of an ideal ...

There is a paucity of research demonstrating how best to address inequalities in health and access to specialist care faced by rural disadvantaged populations in high HIV-prevalent settings in Sub Saharan Africa. Delivering equitable and cost-effective specialist clinical services in many parts of Africa is challenging, given human resource shortages, poor transport infrastructure and competing...

OBJECTIVE This study explored the relationship between perceived barriers to research use and the implementation of evidence-based practice (EBP) among rural hospital nurses. BACKGROUND The Institute of Medicine recommends that 90% of clinical decisions be evidence based by 2020. METHODS This descriptive, quality improvement study used a convenience sampling of registered nurses (RNs). Part...

OBJECTIVE To explore the reasons why individuals recurrently present with asthma to hospital emergency departments. DESIGN A predominantly qualitative study in which participants were interviewed in-depth about their asthma. Data on medication use, respiratory health and asthma knowledge were also collected, and asthma severity was determined from medical records. SETTING A tertiary teachin...

The World Health Organisation estimates there are approximately 3 million cases of needlestick injury (NSI) in healthcare workers (HCW) each year, with 90% of these occurring in developing countries 1 . Student nurses are thought to be at high risk of NSI due to poor technique, inexperience and poor use of universal precautions 2 . There has been little research into the incidence of NSI in Afr...

Faculty in Canadian undergraduate nursing programs have come to rely on preceptorship as the primary model for teaching and learning during the final clinical course. A focused ethnography was completed in order to examine undergraduate nursing students' experience of rural hospital preceptorship in western Canada. Data analysis revealed that students perceive nursing faculty involvement and su...

Sodium reduction strategies on a population-based level are promoted as a public health intervention. Small and rural hospitals in Illinois were funded to adopt sodium reduction strategies as an intervention, have their hospital cafeteria and vending machines assessed via an environmental scan, and participate in an evaluation. Intervention strategies to identify and to label lower-sodium foods...

This article describes the emerging trend of using metrics in rural hospitals to achieve world-class performance. This trend is a response to the fact that rural hospitals have small patient volumes yet must maintain a profit margin in order to fulfill their mission to the community. The conceptual idea for this article is based largely on Robert Kaplan and David Norton's Balanced Scorecard art...

Congress introduced the Rural Health Care Transition (RHCT) Grant Program in 1989 to assist financially troubled, small rural hospitals. This article discusses grant effects on the second cohort of hospitals to complete their 3-year grants. Although three-quarters of the grantees implemented all or most of their goals, 11 percent could not implement a viable project. Grantees added or upgraded ...

Even the smallest, most isolated rural hospitals are now required to have bioterrorism preparedness plans. From the perspective of many rural hospitals, however, there is a disparity between Federal expectations and the realities of small hospitals operating in geographically isolated communities. As part of an effort to better understand how to close this gap, the Walsh Center for Rural Health...