€5.75 Vol 22 No 10 December 2014 / January 2015 Latest course information from Journal of the Irish Nurses and the INMO PDC Midwives Organisation See centre pages World of Irish Nursing & Midwifery Campaign against NMBI fee hike intensifies page 7 Overcrowding reaches crisis point page 10 INMO’s Dean Flanagan heads up ENSA page 46 Festive money saving tips page 71 Solidarity in the new year Nurses and midwives reject NMBI fee increase CONTENTS 3 NEWS & VIEWS 46 Interview Alison Moore speaks to Dean Flanagan 5 Editorial about his new role as president of ENSA Now more than ever, after five years of austerity, nurses and midwives must 51 Media Watch remain united. This is our challenge and Ann Keating reviews INMO activities we are equal to it, writes INMO general reported in the news secretary Liam Doran 55 Midwifery focus 6 News Mary Higgins reports on the recent EMA More than 2,000 nurses and midwives AGM held in Estonia demonstrate against NMBI fee increase... Campaign against fee hike 57 Life story intensifies… Taskforce on nurse staffing A life of love, learning and travelling. Ann completes first phase... INMO issues Keating met with Patricia Marteinsson new mission statement... Hospital who shared her story overcrowding now at crisis point... Update 8 Report from INMO SDC in Croke Park... 65 Round-up of Irish and international news Beaumont ED staff at breaking point... items Unsafe ratios highlighted in St Patrick’s in Waterford... Flawed management structures in HSE revealed... HSE service plan fails to address critical CLINICAL issues... Shift work hits brain function... 59 Clinical focus Water charges – the straw that broke Clare Shields and Declan Lyons discuss the camel’s back? Courting media Merry Christmas the management of treatment-resistant attention at hearings is beyond remit of depression NMBI... Message of solidarity to Ebola and happy new carers... Severe overcrowding in Naas 61 Cardiology sparks protest... Drogheda ED action A team from Trinity College Dublin year to members suspended pending talks describes the protocol involved in Plus: Section news, page 25 the assessment of elderly patients for transcatheter aortic valve implant from all at the 30 International news The INMO hosted three major European meetings in Dublin recently. Elizabeth LIVING INMO Adams reports 69 Book review Niall Hunter reviews the biography 49 From the President Ada English Patriot and Psychiatrist by INMO president Claire Mahon rounds Brendan Kelly up news from the Executive Council and Plus: Monthly crossword competition beyond 52 Student news 71 Finance Dean Flanagan updates readers on Ivan Ahern has some tips on how to save news and events for students and new money over the Christmas period and graduates into the new year FEATURES JOBS & TRAINING 33 Legal focus Edward Mathews outlines how the 37 Professional Development Criminal Justice Act 2012 will affect the Eight-page pull-out section from the practice of nurses and midwives INMO PDC 27 Questions and answers 72 Diary Bulletin board for industrial relations Listing of meetings and events nationally 46 queries and internationally 29 Quality and safety 73 Recruitment & Training This month Maureen Flynn discusses the Latest jobs and training opportunities in WIN value of patient and family-centred care Ireland and overseas Vol 22 No 10 Dec 2014/Jan 2015 Vol WIN – World of Irish Nursing & Midwifery is distributed by controlled circulation to over 36,000 members of the INMO. It is published monthly (10 issues a year) and is registered at the GPO as a periodical. Its contents in full are Copyright© of MedMedia Ltd. No articles may be reproduced either in full or in part without the prior, written permission of the publishers. The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the INMO. Annual Subscription: e145 incl. postage paid. Editorial Statement: WIN is produced by professional medical journalists working closely with individual nurses, midwives and officers on behalf of the INMO. Acceptance of an advertisement or article does not imply endorsement by the publishers or the Organisation. EDITORIAL 5 Just what will the new Journal of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation World of Irish Nursing & Midwifery year bring us? AS WE approach the end of 2014, the fifth (ISSN: 2009-4264) consecutive year of austerity, contraction Volume 22 Number 10 and cutbacks, we are entitled to wonder December 2014 / January 2015 what 2015 will bring for us, as nurses, mid- WIN, wives, public servants and citizens. MedMedia Publications, If we begin by attempting to be posi- 17 Adelaide Street, tive, 2015 promises a stabilisation of the Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin. health budget (at a very low level), a slight Website: www.medmedia.ie reduction in taxation leading to a marginal increase in take-home pay, and the prob- ability of discussions, with government, in our demand for restoration of pay cuts be restored and additional staff to be and reduced working hours. However, recruited is required. any positive feelings must be tempered The challenge, which I believe has been by the likelihood that any proposals from underestimated by policy makers and the Editor Alison Moore Email: [email protected] government or public service manage- HSE, is where we will find the additional Tel: 01 2710216 ment will be marginal and inadequate. nurses/midwives required to restore safe Production editor & news Tara Horan A further positive in the 2015 Service staffing levels right across our services. Plan is the effective lifting of the recruit- There has been a complete underestima- Sub-editor Sharon Murphy ment moratorium and the commitment to tion of the brain drain within nursing and Designers Fiona Donohoe, Paula Quigley increase the number of nurses/midwives midwifery. It will not be possible to sim- Advertising manager Leon Ellison in 2015. This, however belated, is very ply reverse this in the short-term. Email: [email protected] welcome, particularly as we face compe- The new year will also see the Taskforce Tel: 01 2710218 tition from the NHS, which is seeking to on Nurse Staffing and Skill Mix, established Publisher Geraldine Meagan recruit 12,000 nurses immediately. last September, issue its first report to the WIN – World of Irish Nursing & Midwifery If we look at the negatives – and this Minister. This report has the potential is published in conjunction with the is undoubtedly dominating households to bring forward evidence that supports Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation by – 2015 also promises further attacks on a level of minimum staffing required to MedMedia Group, Specialists in Healthcare living standards. If we look outside the optimise patient care in an environment Publishing & Design. health service, we will have new water conducive to best nursing practice. The charges, the possibility that the local implementation of this report will be a property tax will increase as house val- key measure of the Minister’s recognition ues rise, and probable increases in utility that the current nursing workforce is not charges. These will erode any increase in optimal and care is being compromised. take-home pay resulting from a marginal A separate report, on midwifery staffing, reduction in taxation. is also due in 2015. This must also lead to In relation to the health service budget additional midwives being employed, in and service plan for 2015, these offer, order to meet the Birthrate Plus standard. Editor-in-chief: Liam Doran at best, the continuation of service at While nurses/midwives are overworked INMO editorial board: 2014 levels. As we all know, this has and demoralised, now more than ever, we Claire Mahon; Geraldine Talty; David O’Brien; been wholly inadequate and has resulted must remain united and solid. This will Moira Craig; Theresa Dixon; Martina Harkin-Kelly; in a severe increase in overcrowding, ensure that we can extract, from 2015, Eileen Kelly; Martin McCullough; waiting times and contractions of com- every single resource possible, both as cit- Catherine Sheridan; Mary Leahy munity-based services. The latest trolley izens and health professionals, to improve INMO journal co-ordinator: Ann Keating watch figures, for November, covered on our lives at home and at work. This is our Email: [email protected] page 10, make for stark reading for those challenge and I believe we are equal to it. WIN INMO photographer: Lisa Moyles who formulate and implement policy On behalf of the president, Executive for our health service. The increase in Council and staff can I take this opportu- 22 No 10 Dec 2014/Jan 2015 Vol INMO correspondence to: overcrowding, resulting in over 7,000 nity to wish each and every member, and Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, admitted patients being left on trolleys your loved ones, a happy and peaceful Whitworth Building, North Brunswick Street, in November, cannot be ignored and can- Christmas and may good health follow Dublin 7. not be corrected by high level reviews, you throughout 2015. Tel: 01 664 0600 strategies or working groups. A signifi- Fax: 01 661 0466 cant increase in funding, sustained over Email: [email protected] an extended period, that allows closed Liam Doran Website: www.inmo.ie beds to be open, community services to General Secretary, INMO 6 NEWS Protest outside NMBI head office: INMO make their voices heard about the Board’s unjustified hike in the retention fee Unions protest at NMBI fee increase More than 2,000 nurses and midwives voice their outright opposition THE INMO, SIPTU and the is saying it must seek this tion fee of €100, which is the INMO general secretary PNA, on behalf of all of nurses increase despite the fact that: same retention fee levied on Liam Doran said: “This pro- and midwives, held a pub- • Nurses and midwives have all allied health professionals test gave nurses and midwives lic protest outside the head suffered at a minimum a • The need for a regulatory the opportunity to directly offices of the Nursing and Mid- reduction in salary of over body that protects the pub- demonstrate their disagree- wifery Board of Ireland (NMBI) 14% in the past four years lic by ensuring that nurses ment with this fee increase to last month.