The energy crisis of change

This paper explores the methods that nursing has used to introduce new practice to the clinical environment. The implementation of the nursing process will provide an example of how nursing has attempted to change practice in totality and why the methods used perhaps undermined the original objectives. The use of 'change-agents' and action research to effect change in the ward environment will then be discussed. Particular attention will be paid to the idea of an 'energy crisis'--which may be an inevitable side effect of the change process--and how the programme of development at Ladywell Hospital has taken account of, and acted upon, this problem.