Achieving a professional practice model. How primary nursing can help

The authors of this article show how a change to primary nursing causes a series of predictable changes in hospital organizations and nursing departments. They conceptualize the series of changes as a continuum. Using their continuum as a framework, they analyze primary nursing at six acute care hospitals, noting how the changes in nursing practice affect seven key variables in the organization. Nursing leaders may wish to use the insights provided by the framework to push their organizations further toward the goal of more autonomy, power, and achieving a model of professional practice.