Evidence based guidelines provide a plan of action to guide health professionals in making decisions about treatment and care, supporting them to achieve better outcomes. We are striving to produce a suite of region- and context-specific evidence-based children’s nursing practice guidelines, which will be an entirely new resource in Africa.
As part of their second-year studies, students on the Master of Nursing in Child Nursing programme are facilitated to each lead the initial stage of development for a particular topic guideline in partial fulfilment of their degree. An accessible summary of the guideline is produced as a poster and published online using an academically and professionally credible platform (OpenUCT). We hope to achieve publication of at least one peer-reviewed guideline by 2021. In addition, we anticipate that from 2022, at least two peer-reviewed fully developed guidelines will be published per calendar year. The potential for students/graduates to contribute to co-authoring a peer reviewed publication is an important part of their professional development and will make a positive contribution to advancing nurse-led clinical governance and leadership in Africa’s child health services.
These guidelines are a much-needed resource in Africa and we are excited about their potential to contribute to improved nursing practices and child health outcomes.
Evidence based guidelines currently available on OpenUCT:
Ethics and professionalism on social media use by healthcare professionals
High flow oxygen therapy in general paediatric wards
Therapeutic hypothermia protocol for a limited resource setting
Gastroschisis management in a low resource setting
Topics currently under development:
The nurse's role in the care of a neonate on CPAP in NICU
The registered nurse's role in the prevention of errors in the preparation and administration of IV medication to infants and children
The nurse's role in the administration of medication via gastrostomy in children
The nurse's role in the management of an indwelling chemoport in children
