PLEASE RESPOND TO THE FOLLOWING IN 50 WORDS OR MORE:

The Nursing Legislation and Advocacy page on the FNA website identifies 4-different ways for you to get involved with advocacy.  Discuss which way(s) you would most likely get involved with and why?

One of the four different ways to get involved with advocacy that I would get involved in according to the FNA website would be joining the Barbara Lumpkin Institute to have public policy education readily available to improve the healthcare system. By joining this group, I would be given the opportunity to annual symposium and provide financial support to nurses who are involved in healthcare policy (FNA). I love to enjoy researching different topics and interviewing my colleagues on how we can improve to be as safe as possible. I would emphasize the importance of patient-to-nurse ratios and how to manage the nursing shortage starting with staff burnout. There needs to be more support for bedside nursing as it seems like the rate of people going this route is less and less. 

Find and peruse the Barbara Lumpkin Toolkit (BLT).  What are your thoughts about the information provided in the toolkit and what did you learn that you didn’t know before?

I think that the Barbra Lumkin Toolkit (BLT) is an excellent tool to use for anyone looking to promote advocacy in the healthcare setting.  Advocacy is such an important part of nursing not only for our patients but for ourselves as nurses as well. I especially liked learning about the “Ten Commandments for successful living with your legislator”. Something that I didn’t know before is that anyone can call or write to the legislators regarding their reason for change or alteration to current bills. I think that it is so important that nurses get their voices heard and share their opinions with the people who are involved with making changes to the healthcare system. 

References 

Florida Nurses Association. Barbara Lumpkin Institute. (n.d.). https://www.floridanurse.org/Links to an external site.