Reflecting on International Nurses Day this month was a time to celebrate and be proud of why we entered the profession and why we call ourselves nurses. Among some truly wonderful examples of practice development and research shared at my own organisation's celebrations, two of the most powerful sessions for me included hearing personal stories from our ‘Daisy’ award winners and presenting four long service awards to nurses who had all delivered over 40 years of NHS nursing each. I felt very reconnected with the profession and reflected that we should never underestimate the difference we can make for the people that we work with and those in receipt of our services and their families.
In 2015, the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) published a strategy setting out development plans in order to fulfil its mission to protect patients and the public effectively and efficiently. This would incorporate the revised NMC Code (2018), containing a series of statements that taken together signify what good nursing and midwifery practice looks like: putting the interests of patients and service users first, providing safe and effective care and promoting trust through professionalism.
The NMC launched professional revalidation in 2016. In discussing what this involves, the regulator makes the point that revalidation is about promoting good practice, as well as strengthening public confidence in the nursing and midwifery professions. It is also stated that revalidation helps to encourage a culture of sharing, reflection and improvement—that it will provide benefits for nurses as well as the people they care for.
Latterly, the four national Chief Nursing Officers, working alongside the NMC, took forward a nationwide initiative to define what ‘professionalism’ means in practice. The work was chaired by Professor Charlotte McArdle. This has led to the development of a revised conceptual framework, Enabling Professionalism (Northern Ireland Practice and Education Council, 2022a; 2022b). The framework defines professionalism as characterised by:
‘The autonomous evidence-based decision making by members of an occupation who share the same values and education.’
It goes on to discuss that professionalism in nursing and midwifery is ‘realised through purposeful relationships and underpinned by environments that facilitate professional practice’ reflecting that ‘professional nurses and midwives demonstrate and embrace accountability for their actions’.
The framework concentrates on maintaining professionalism as being underpinned by the NMC Code, and demonstrated through a number of attributes:
- Being accountable
- Being a leader
- Being an advocate
- Being competent.
There are further elements to the framework involving leaders enabling professionalism through:
- Recognition and encouragement of nursing and midwifery leadership
- Encouragement for autonomous innovative nursing and midwifery practice.
- Enabling practice learning and development
- Provision of appropriate resources.
And finally, there are key areas we must all consider our own individual responsibility to uphold professionalism:
- Learning and developing
- Being a role model
- Supporting appropriate service and care environments
- Enabling person-centred and evidence-informed practice
- Leading professionally.
The framework was officially launched on International Nurses Day 2022 alongside the ‘Here for Life’ campaign (https://herefor.life), which aims to empower nurses and midwives to tell their own stories, so that the general public will develop a fuller understanding of the breadth and diversity of nursing and midwifery roles and expertise, and the impact that these professions have on the people they care for and on our society as a whole.
The Here for Life campaign is asking registered midwives and nurses to share their own story on social media using the hashtag #HereforLife. This can be a single image or video clip that gives an example of something you do in your role that makes you ‘Here for Life’ or that sums up who you are and what you do as a nurse or midwife.
The campaign will also be asking the public to get involved by sharing a photo or story of a moment when the skills of a nurse or midwife made a significant difference to them or a loved one. After the last couple of years that the profession has been through, I think that this is a really positive way to celebrate our wonderful profession and I hope it will reignite individuals' pride and help to recruit and retain colleagues.