BACCN Conference – York, 2008 – Impressions of a novice ICU nurse
I was fortunate to have been able to attend this year’s BACCN Conference thanks to the encouragement and support of my ICU mentors, and agreed to share my impressions as a relative novice to ICU nursing.
This was my first nursing conference and I was struck by a number of things.
York is a beautiful and historic city and the Racecourse, with all its quiet grandeur and more than adequate conference facilities, was a superb choice of venue.
The conference itself was very well organised and managed, with experienced and attentive staff. There was a seemingly endless array of exhibitions and stalls to inform and spark interest. The keynote speeches were relevant, inspiring and informative and, in the case of Peter Sharp and his ‘serotonin moments’, amusing as well as supportive in focussing on the need for self-care in order to be able to care. The food was good, and the conference dinner a triumph – a lovely meal in the atmospheric and memorable setting of York’s National Railway Museum, the evening replete with music, dance, games and much laughter – definitely ‘serotonin moments’ in abundance! It was also lovely to meet up with former colleagues now working elsewhere and hearing about their new experiences and development.
But what inspired and re-invigorated me most of all was just how caring, competent and collaborative nurses are and, once again, how proud I am to be a member of this profession despite all the exhaustion and bureaucracy which threatens so often to drown out the excitement and joy of knowing that perhaps you have made a difference to someone’s life, been instrumental in their recovery, reassured and supported family and friends well or provided a safe and dignified atmosphere when nothing more could be done.
At presentation after presentation, and in each poster, it was clear to see that nurses care enough to want to identify concerns or problems and find ways of changing things for the better, always with the aim of providing enhanced nursing care.
Just hearing them present evidence of their efforts to improve service or serve in challenging circumstances such as a field hospital in Afghanistan, speaks to nurse’s competence and professionalism, not to mention bravery every day wherever they work.
And I will dare to say that across the entire medical system, nurses are already supreme collaborators, both because we have to be in order to provide and orchestrate holistic care to our patients and because we are the glue that holds the system together. Yes, there is always room for development and growth, but we collaborate constantly and, most often, very well. Whether our ‘shop floor’ collaborations and communications are always invited or heard is another matter, and therein lies scope for development and collaborating with each other through conferences such as this in order to encourage and inspire each other’s confidence.
And it is all these things (and more, of course) that have to conspire to improve patient safety overall and identify deteriorating patients in particular: caring enough to notice, the competence to act quickly and decisively and the skills to collaborate effectively with whoever is necessary to inform and enhance the care in which we collaborate. It was not just in politeness that Mandy Odell was strongly applauded across the board when she suggested that nurses best serve patients when they are actually free to be at (or at least near) the bedside. As a novice ICU nurse, I cannot emphasise enough how important it is that more experienced and confident colleagues are near the bedside as much as possible, especially when the indecisiveness and sheer terror (at times) of inexperience can have a paralysing effect.
Attending the conference this year has been informative and thought-provoking, yes, but equally it has been a humbling and inspiring experience which has re-invigorated and refocused. For all this, I am grateful.
Michal Nixon
Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust
30 March, 2009
