Watching the Glass: Policy Hurdles for 21st Century Nurses

Our nursing clinical identity is being neglected as it dwindles into a support role for other clinicians. Underlying this process is a web of policies involving health practitioner licensure and credentialling, standardizing of nursing undergraduate preparation, hospital staffing models and nursing work design, nurse authorization limitations, government funding of nursing services and client access to insurance items and other subsidies in the private nursing market. Constraints placed on clinical nurses working in institutional services result in systematic deskilling and dismissal of the comprehensive knowledge and contribution of nurses. Nurses of the 21st century need to be savvy and earnest in reforming policy if they are to rescue the profession from the relentless contraction of clinical nursing status and profile that is happening worldwide. If a revival of clinical nursing as a professional role by 2030 is the goal, the process of reform needs to start now.