Committee Meetings and Minutes

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Nursing Advisory Committee

Meeting Minutes

Current Status of Minutes: Final
Date	February 26, 2010
Time	7:45 AM - 10:00 AM
Location	Eastveiw 8358

Members Present
Gail Acuna, Lana Cameron, Sally Foster, Maureen Havrilla, Elizabeth Huss, Debra Jones, Eileen Klein, Melinda LaPrade, Sandra McCrary-Marshall, Joan Minnick, Colleen Mullins, Patricia Recek, Gail Roberts, Antoinette Rowin, Yvonne VanDyke, Nancy Walters
Guests Present
No guest attendance has been recorded.

Item # 1:	Approval of Agenda
Presenter	Yvonne VanDyke
Discussion	Yvonne Van Dyke moved the approval of the agenda with the addition of Introductions, seconded by Monica Minewiser. Nancy Walters moved to change the order of the agenda moving the Hospital Updates to the beginning of the agenda to allow representatives ample time to share news from their faculties and move each of the ACC programs reports back in order. Seconded by S. McCrary-Marshall . Agenda approved as amended.

Item # 2:	Approval of Minutes
Presenter	Yvonne VanDyke
Discussion	Y. VanDyke moved the approval of the March 09 minutes, seconded by N. Walters. Minutes approved as written.

Item # 3:	Clinical Facilities Updated
Presenter	Hospital/Clinic Representatives
Discussion	Acute Care: Seton * Seton's newest facility in Hays has opened and been warmly welcomed by the community. There are currently there are 112 beds and the complex is designed to grow to almost 300 beds, an outpatient surgery center. * Relationship based care, we have been looking very hard at 2015-we know that our community will continue to grow and the healthcare needs of this community will be expanding. * Y. VanDyke reported a current affiliation agreement with UT Southwestern. Seton Family of Hospitals is expanding research efforts. Each organization is expanding electronic medical records systems and will be fully implemented in order to not impact Medicare patients and remimbursement. Changes are happening in Healthcare that will be impacting the organization tremendously. New graduates are moving into a field that is dynamic and unpredictable. Nurses are no longer able to dictate where and when they want to work. We as a community need a well trained and educated nursing workforce to care for the expanding patient base and acuity. * Linda Carpenter reminded that facilities that the educational institutions and the hospitals must work together to train the student /graduates to be the best nurses possible. Yvonne VanDyke interjected that it would be very beneficial to work with the faculty to aid in teaching the students the most modern technology. St. David's- * St. David's has purchased Heart Hospital of Austin. * The Institute for Learning is currently in the process of expanding what services it will be provide. (Name Change) * Hiring needs for GN is not quite as high as Seton, but will continue to work on increasing the number of new hires as each units needs are reviewed. * Uniform initiative –St. David's has standardized the uniform worn by employees in an effort to help the patients clearly understand the role of the individual health care team members. (HST's) Pat Recek informed the committee that ACC will be going to one standard color for all students in all program at ACC (TEAL). Some concerns have been raised regarding how ACC's two nursing program will be distinguished from each other. Gail Acuna was asked if the LVN could wear the teal pants with their current white top, and the RN's will continue to wear their solid teal scrubs. Ms. Acuna stated that she would need to get approval from administration. * South Austin Medical Center-JM reported the expansion to almost 300 beds * Ms. Acuna asked if the Advisory Committee Minutes could be sent out within two weeks after the meeting date. Several members of the committee confirmed that the minutes from the March 09 meeting were sent out one week after the last meeting for the committee to review. Central Texas Medical Center- * Expansion of Women's Services area with a NICU, our census has expanded. We are now beginning computerized charting. CTMC is a part of Adventist Health. * Two years ago we started our graduate nurse program with two GN. We have now expanded the program to 12 GN's each year. Scott and White Healthcare – * Scott and White Healthcare-Melinda LaPrade reported that Scott and White continues to grow and expand in the Austin and surrounding areas. Scott and While is still hiring, they currently offer a graduate nurses program. Other- * Long Term Care-Monica Minewiser reported long term care has become more long term acute care. The role of long term care facilities has changed as the elder population increases and more patients are being released from the hospitals and returned to the Long Term Care facilities with acute illnesses and injuries. Pat Recek asked Monica how she sees the need in long term care changing in the coming years. Ms. Minewiser responded that more and more patients are coming into their facilities with acute illnesses that require the nurses to have outstanding skills. Blaise Faxique indicated his agreement with Monica regarding the acuity of the patients coming into the Long Term Care facility. He reported recently attending a recruitment fair with the intent of hiring RN's, however, most RN's don't want to work in a long term care facility but rather in the hospital because of the benefits. The LVN's working in long term care facilities must be have a broad knowledge base, with outstanding nursing skills in order to keep up with the demands of patient care required. * Mental Health/Illness: No representation present * Community: No representation present.

Item # 4:	Associate Degree Nursing
Presenter	Nancy Walters
Discussion	Enrollment COHORT Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Mobility CEC 49 46 49 44 EVC 54 44 47 53 33 HYB 35 25 31 30 FBG 8 TOTAL 138 115 127 127 41 Total in program=548 N. Walters reported that the ADN Program will probably be expanding it's Hybrid group in the coming semesters to effectively meet the demand of the current student population. Round Rock Campus is on schedule to open in Fall 2010. A cohort of first (1st) Level students will be admitted with one level being added each semester until the complete curriculum is being offered on this site. The hybrid groups Level 1-4 will be assigned to the Round Rock Campus. Graduates: Spring 2009=123 Summer 2009 = 59 (Mobility 49, Trad. 10) Fall 2009=112 RN NLCEX Pass Rates: Final Report 2009 (October 1, 2008-September 30, 2009) – 98.73% First Quarter 2010 (October 1, 2009-December 31, 2009) Texas: 37/37 – 100% Out of State: 2/2 – 100% Curriculum- The ADN program has incorporated the RNSG 2130 course to include the content related to the Jurisprudence portion of the BON requirements for graduation. Faculty Updates-Currently we have several Full-time faculty positions available. We also are always on the lookout for qualified adjunct faculty to supplement our clinical needs. Admission Coordinator- Robin Graybill the Nursing Admissions Coordinator has accepted another position within the college. The position will be posted soon and a candidate will be hired as soon as possible. Until that time, our current office staff will be taking on the duties of this position. Round Rock Expansion-to be opened in Fall 2010. Other-ACC-ADN program has been awarded a HURSA Grant, The "Nursing's Under-Represented Students in Education (NURSE) Success" Project will focus its efforts on interventions that increase the proportion of ethnic/racial minority and economically disadvantaged students who apply, are admitted, and graduate from the ACC Associate Degree Nursing program. The geographic area for this project includes the rural eigth-county Austin Community College service area in which minorities comprise 42% of the population, yet, represent only 16% of the nursing workforce, and where rural communities have an unequal participation in nursing education. These aforementioned disparities serve as barriers to achieving a healthcare delivery system that services all central Austin area equitably. The NURSE Success Project components include: 1) Pre-entry activities targeting "under-represented" high school juniors and seniors, existing Licensed Vocational Nurses (LVN), paramedics and other health sciences and community college students as the target population from whom to increase the proportion of minorities in the Registered Nurse (RN) pipeline. 2) Pre-admission testing and assessment surveys to identify students at risk academically and for whom tutoring and retention services will be targeted. 3) Development of Individualized Retention Plans for student, including appropriate remediation activities addressing individual student needs that are followed by the Retention Coordinator. 4) Remediation interventions provided to students who do not successfully complete the pre-entrance Health Science Education Systems, Inc (HESI) exam on their initial attempts 5) Stipends will be available to students who meet grant eligibility criteria. ACC Health Sciences will also be working to expand the Star Grant which tracks student's success and evaluates their risk score to help them be more successful. We are working with the ESL faculty to review nursing tests and analyze the stem of the questions to verify if the programs tests questions are written in a way that ESL students can use proper test taking strategies to obtain the correct answer. In addition, several stipends were distributed to students who were dimed to be at risk for failure due to financial burdens. ACC-Nursing as also partnered with Capital Idea to provide funding and support to some students. Capital Idea has just hired a tutor to work with the nursing students funded by their organization in their areas of weakness. Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board: has placed all nursing schools in regions to more effectively utilize resources. The Central Texas region will be holding several workshops on simulation and our goal is to send all faculty members to one of the scheduled workshop. Clinical partners are welcome to attend and N. Walters has emailed out the registration information for ease and convenience. Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board has awarded the ADN program a financial award for increasing their graduation rate last year. Toni Rowen asked Nan if there were any articulation agreements in place to aid students moving from ADN to BSN with as much ease as possible. E. Klein interjected that ACC would love to increase the number of agreements currently in place with other colleges around the state to offer the students as many educational options as possible.

Item # 5:	Vocational Nursing
Presenter	Sandra McCrary-Marshall
Discussion	Enrollment Data COHORT Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Total By Campus EVC 43 35 0 28 106 FBG 11 11 Total 43 46 0 28 117 Graduates: Spring 2009=26 Fall 2009=33 PN NLCEX Pass Rates: Final Report 2009 (January 2009-December 2009) – 98.25% Oath Ceremony: The program continues to conduct an Oath Ceremony during the first semester of the program. It has proven to increase the students' commitment to maintaining professional standards of conduct while in the classroom and clinical settings. Curriculum: * Feedback on student evaluation of clinical sites have been very positive, the learning opportunities being provided are meeting educational outcomes. * Expanding non acute care sites: Austin State Supported Living Center (formerly Austin State School), correctional facilities, and Rehabilitation Units. * The program will begin offering Hybrid courses during Spring 2011 in an effort to allow student more flexibility in their schedule while pursuing their nursing education. * According to the Future of Nursing Education Forum in response to the need for additional content and clinical experience related to older adult health in nursing education, the program has expanded our collaboration with long term care facilities to meet the needs of the growing population of geriatric patients (older adult). * With the increasing acuity of the long term care patients, the LVN students really need to continue having Acute Care experience in the hospitals so that the students can learn how to safely care for the increasing complexity of the patients within the long term care facilities. * Kris Benton, VNG faculty member is also a member of the Board of Nursing. She helps keeps the faculty abreast of all upcoming curriculum changes. * Sandra reminded the committee that LVN's hold a very valuable place in the Healthcare Community. All nurses must start somewhere and should be embraced into the profession and encouraged to continue their education.

Item # 6:	Health Professions Institute
Presenter	Elizabeth Huss
Discussion	Re-entry Nursing Statistics Monthly Totals RN (LVN) Virtual Total ACC 2008 1/5/09 24 (4) 18 46 17 (5)-22 3/2/09 8-23 (2)* 28 61 12 (3)-15 4/27/09 16 (5) 14 35 19 (8)-27 6/22/09 8 (3) 15 26 23 (6)-29 8/10/09 12 (5) 12 29 23 (8)-31 10/12/09 10-20 (6) 19 55 19(6)-25 1/4/10 5-16 (2)* 22 45 3/1/10 12-13 (7)* 18 50 Ms. Huss revealed that she is seeing a change in the level of technical knowledge of the older Re-Enter nurses coming back into the profession. The mean age of a re-entry nursing student is hard to determine. The oldest to come through our program has been 69 and the youngest is 32. One of things that make our re-entry program successful is that the faculty really keep in touch with the students and track their progress. Re-entry Faculty: Online: Alisa Monacelli, Gail Roberts, Wendy Pickard, Michelle Hackney Skills Lab: Stacy Dudley, Yolanda Hall, Ronda Mackey, Tangia Adams, Pam Bayles-Heart Hospital, Justin Bowman-Flight Nurse, Elizabeth Hopkins Goals: New Independent Studies: * Over the Counter Medication Update * Cardiac Drug Update * Protocols for Management of Cardiac Conditions * Non-Surgical Cardiac Interventions * Current Surgical Cardiac Procedures * Pain Management as the fifth Vital Sign In production: * Two on diabetic care * Two on massage therapy modalities * Part two Pain Management * It was suggested that ACC-Health Professions develop a dosage and calculation course to aid students who are transferring from another school or state.

Item # 7:	New Business
Presenter	Yvonne VanDyke
Discussion	-None

Item # 8:	Announcements
Presenter	Yvonne VanDyke
Discussion	* Eileen reported a significant reduction in the number of OTA, PTA clinical placement space within the hospital systems due to turn over of hospital staff. Mrs. Klein asked if Ms. Acuna and Ms. Foster could review those areas to see if the staff situation has stabilized. * ACC has hired a consultant to review growth areas in the community in order for the college to expand. Areas that the college is looking to bring into ACC's service area: Hays, Elgin-Manor etc. * S. McCrary-Marshall told the hospital representative that the students and faculty sometimes have difficulty obtaining the use of a medication chart while in the clinical areas. Ms. VanDyke stated they would make a note of this concern and see if there is a way to address the problem. Gail Acuna added that the best thing to come out of this kind of committee is the ability to share the problems the schools are experiencing. Ms. Acuna wanted the schools to know that the Program Directors can freely contact her to discuss any issues as they arise.

Austin Community College
5930 Middle Fiskville Rd.
Austin, Texas 78752-4390
512.223.4ACC (4222)