Discussion 7

 

Although nurses take active leadership roles in hospitals throughout the U.S., they are underrepresented on hospital boards. Since a 2011 survey found that only 6%Links to an external site. of board members in 1000 hospitals were nurses (meanwhile 20% were physicians) there has been a push toward including nurses in the boardroom. As part of this push, a national coalition of organizations, including the American Nurses Association (ANA), the American Academy of Nursing (AAN), and the American Nurses Foundation (ANF) among 18 other nationally-recognized organizations, has been formed to create the Nurses on Boards CoalitionLinks to an external site., which seeks to implement a comprehensive strategy that will “bring nurses’ valuable perspective to governing boards, as well as state-level and national commissions.” With big players like AARP and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation backing this initiative, it is likely their recommendation that nurses play bigger roles in “improving the health of all Americans” will see mores nurses becoming movers and shakers not only in their field but also in hospitals as a whole.

After completing the required readings identified above, please respond to the following prompt:

Choose one of the ten barriers identified in Addressing Barriers in Leadership for Nurses and search the library databases for at least one quality/scholarly article that pertains to the barrier and discuss/share the findings in the article.  Does the article support or refute the concept of the barrier?  What questions are left unanswered in the article?