Update November 2008

Prof Glenn Gardner Queensland University of Technology - Brisbane,
Prof Anne Gardner James Cook University - Townsville,
Prof Sandy Middleton Australian Catholic University - Sydney,
Prof Phillip Della Curtin University of Technology - Perth.

In the last ANPA newsletter, we introduced the Australian Nurse Practitioner study (AUSPRAC), a three year Australian Research Council funded study that investigates the profile, process and outcome of Australian Nurse Practitioners. The findings from this research will contribute to future health workforce planning and will develop new ways to study NP and other healthcare services. The outcomes from this research will also be valuable for nurse practitioners; providing information for building practice, tructuring or re-structuring roles, providing evidence for service or expansion of service and validated processes for conducting research into their own practice.

Readers will recall that in 2007 we conducted a national survey of authorised nurse practitioners. The findings from that study were presented at the 2008 ANPA conference in Melbourne in October. The report has also been submitted to an Australian peer-reviewed journal for publication. When published we intend to circulate the paper through the ANPA email network.

This year we have implemented Phase 2 of the study. This has been a major undertaking with on-the-ground research into nurse practitioner service across the country. The scope of this study has not before been attempted either in Australia or elsewhere, so it is important work that can potentially influence nurse practitioner development internationally. A vast team of people were necessary to the successful completion of this Phase 2, so we will take some time to describe and acknowledge their contribution.

The nurse practitioners. Requirements of confidentiality prevent us from naming the individual clinicians who were involved in the work sampling study - but you know who you are. Your contribution was momentous and we sincerely thank you. There were 30 of you spread throughout Australia. You worked in major city hospitals, community centres, regional centres, rural communities and remote stations. You worked in isolation, in close teams, in high pressure environments and in individual consultations. In volunteering to participate in this research you tolerated a data collector following, observing, questioning and recording your every activity in 40 two-hour blocks spread over a six week timeframe. In all we collected 12,500 occasions of data on the activity pattern of NP practice and we look forward to analysing these data and communicating the findings to you and our collaborators. We will be presenting the findings to the international community at the Royal College of Nursing International Research Conference in Cardiff, Wales in 2009.

We also acknowledge the contribution of your service team colleagues who no doubt occasionally tripped over, fell over or bumped into one of our data collectors.

So thanks again to the nurse practitioners who so generously participated in this work sampling research.

The data collectors. We cannot individually name them but we acknowledge the contribution of the 35 data collectors who collected the work sampling data. This team was drawn from all round Australia each to follow individual nurse practitioners and record their work activity. The data collectors underwent intensive training to develop competency with the tools and process of data collection and ventured fearlessly into unknown environments in pursuit of data.

Sharyn Plath RN, NP from Redcliffe Hospital emergency department contributed to the training by allowing a media team from QUT to follow her at work with a camera for 6 hours. This provided the footage for our data collector training DVD. A particular thank you to Sharyn, her colleagues and patients.

So we want to thank you, all of you for your enthusiastic work on this project.

Case Study Research

Before 2008 is finished we will also have completed the second project in AUSPRAC Phase 2. This is the case study omponent. Twelve of you and your teams from 6 jurisdictions have volunteered to participate in the case study research. The objectives of this phase, which is currently underway, is to:

• Conduct an in-depth investigation on the intersection of NP service with established service processes;
• Examine the impact of NP service on team function; and,
• Examine patients' perceptions and experiences of NP service.

Case study research typically employs multiple methods and multiple data sources, and for each NP service site we will be collecting data through service reconnaissance, interviews with NPs, their health professional colleagues and their patients, and information from the patient health records.

Not only but also...

After a well deserved rest from AUSPRAC over Christmas and New Year all Australian nurse practitioners will again be invited to fill out the survey questionnaire we ran in 2007. Data from this second survey will enable us to identify trends in Australian nurse practitioner service.

Patient Outcomes research will be conducted in 2009 to evaluate the outcomes of NP service, including patient determined outcomes, resource usage and patient safety. This process will include collecting data from a patient sample of approximately 300 (30- 50 for each State / Territory) from selected NP service sites.

Finally, if you would like to know more about the Australian Nurse Practitioner Project, please contact the Project Coordinator, Dr. Victoria Kain, on 07 3636 8725 or at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .