Latest Nursing News

Glow-in-the-dark toilet seats have been credited with improving safety at a Melbourne hospital by cutting falls among elderly patients.

A plan to train nurses and other health professionals to take over some GP roles has polarised the debate on solving the doctor shortage. 

YOU would have thought a baby bonus would be a godsend for midwives, but an Australian baby bonus - the original one, back in 1912 - more or less killed off the profession at a stroke. In that year the Labor government of Andrew Fisher passed the Maternity Allowances Act, which entitled each new mother regardless of income to a payment of five pounds.

IT was 8am and Sally - not her real name - had been in labour all night. She was tired but exhilarated; this was the moment she had waited for. This was her first baby, she was healthy and had been assessed as "low risk", so she was confident. The labour was hard, but she received all the support she needed from her partner and the midwives, who had been wonderful. Her labour crossed three shifts of nurses.

Tensions between midwives and private obstetricians have boiled over as the groups battle over safety, statistics and what is best for women and their babies.

New credentials for midwives assisting in low risk births may pave the way for a midwifery-managed birthing model to be established in Maitland, a young mother has said.

A KEY critic of midwife-led birthing centres who claimed an international study showed they increased baby death rates by 85per cent has been attacked as "irresponsible" by the British expert who helped write it.

Not directly nursing related, but I thought it was a bit of fun to show where technology is heading in health care.

Israel-based Tadiran Spectralink has used its considerable mobile communication expertise to create a portable “mini-hospital” to make life easier for at-risk patients, chronically ill patients and people requiring nursing care.

Mental health services in Australia are overwhelmingly under-resourced and many people are unable to access even basic public sector mental health care, according to the September issue of the Australian Nursing Journal.

The health and medical workforce is set for a major shake-up, with a government inquiry poised to recommend an overhaul of the traditional roles of doctors, nurses and allied health workers to keep pace with demand for services.