Legal/Regulatory Issue Assignment
Purpose
Nursing administrators are often called upon to provide descriptive, factual, and unbiased information on a current nursing topic of interest as a foundation for group discussions. This sometimes happens as part of strategic planning. The purpose of this assignment is two-fold. The first purpose is to investigate a current issue and/or trend in nursing and its relationship to current or pending legislation, regulatory standards, nursing standards of practice, and the impact of the trend on organization and patient care quality and safety. The second purpose is to provide an opportunity to engage in a specific form of scholarly inquiry, expository writing. (CO2, CO3, CO4, CO5)
Course Outcomes
Through this assignment, the student will demonstrate the ability to do the following.
(CO2) Evaluate human resource theories and processes, including implementation of professional practice models and strategies in healthcare settings to support a caring environment. (PO2, PO3, & PO5)
(CO3) Appraise the effects of strategies to reduce costs and improve the quality and safety of healthcare. (PO1 & PO4)
(CO4) Organize legal and regulatory components of healthcare strategies to promote safety and quality care. (PO1 & PO4)
(CO5) Synthesize and communicate research findings to promote quality improvement and safety in healthcare. (PO1& PO4)
Total Points Possible: 200
PREPARING THE PAPER
Nursing administrators have a responsibility to remain current with knowledge of emerging trends in healthcare and their potential impact on nursing practice, safe and quality patient care, and on the costs, risks and/or benefits to the organization. How these trends or issues translate into practice is often determined by legal and regulatory actions as well nursing standards of practice.
The focus of the quarterly regional meeting of your state nurses’ association is on current issues/trends affecting nursing practice. The meeting will be divided into three group forums, each focused on a different trend/issue. You have been asked to provide a short paper on one of the current trends/issues occurring in healthcare delivery that will be the focus of one of the group forums.
Trends and Issues in Current Nursing Practice
1. Telehealth/Telemedicine
2. Mandatory Overtime
3. Patient Violence to Nursing
For this assignment, you will select one of the three topics above about which you will develop an expository type of essay to be shared among the members of the group forum. (An expository essay is one that presents factual, unbiased information on a subject.) Each section provides calls for specific and factual information about the topic with one section at the end for your opinion and rationale based on your findings from your exploration. Therefore, following the provided outline/format provided is key to a successfully written paper.
REQUIREMENTS:
1. Use the following format outline/template for your paper to complete your assignment. Bold-type is used here for emphasis only. Follow the guidelines for use of bold-type and headings using the most current edition of the APA manual. Notice there is NO HEADING for the introductory paragraph and the title of the paper should be at the beginning just before the introductory paragraph. There is also no running head.
Legal/Regulatory Issue Assignment (Paper title)
Statement of paper’s purpose
Rationale for choosing the trend for exploration
Overview of what will be included in the paper
Trend/Issue
Thorough description of chosen trend/issue
Prevalence in healthcare, your state, and your organization
Current Legal and Regulatory Status
Current and/or pending legislative actions described
Current and/or pending regulatory agency actions described
Impact on Nursing Practice
State Board of Nursing Position
Relationship to Standards of Practice
Patient Impact
Impact on patient safety and quality of care
Two examples of positive impact
Two examples of negative impact with strategy for mitigation
Organization Impact
Impact of topic on organization clearly articulated
Costs to organization in human and material resources
Potential liability risks with strategy for mitigation
Potential benefits to the organization
Personal Position
Personal position with rationale on the trend/issue based on exploration
Two strategies to use to advocate for or against the trend/issue
Conclusion
A restatement of the paper’s purpose
A summary of what was covered in the paper
2. A minimum of three (3) scholarly sources, no older than 5 years must be used for the paper. These should be relevant to nursing and should represent most of the evidence provided in the paper. Other sources, such as textbooks, may be used in addition to these; however, they will not be counted as part of the scholarly source requirement.
3. The paper should contain all elements required under the requirements and provided by the outline.
4. The outline provided should be followed for organizing the paper. Remember, the introduction does not have a heading.
5. Paper length is 4-5 pages, excluding title and reference pages.
6. Microsoft (MS) Word is required for completing the assignment per Chamberlain policy. The paper should be written in third person, active voice.
7. The assignment is graded on quality of written communication using standard English grammar, sentence structure, use of scholarly evidence, and organization based on the required components. Quality is also measured by completeness of required content elements of the assignment
