Registered Nurses as Professionals, Advocates, Innovators, and Collaborative Leaders: Executive Summary

This article concludes a series that described work completed by the American Nurses Association (ANA) Barriers to RN Scope of Practice Professional Issues Panel (Panel). The Panel has summarized the roles of the registered nurse (RN) as professional, advocate, innovator, and collaborative leader. As professionals, RNs are accountable for their own educational development, growth of their own practice, and execution of their own professional role. As advocates, RNs provide direct and indirect care focused on the achievement of optimal health. As innovators, RNs act as agents of change in driving processes and policy and leveraging technology. As collaborative leaders, RNs lead within the professional practice setting with state-specific nurse practice acts, a defined scope of practice, and nurse-led initiatives. In this article, Panel members describe their methodology, offer role definitions and recommendations, and provide individual recommendations for RNs to remove barriers and practice to the full extent of their scope of practice. We conclude with some future considerations.