On the road to Magnet status

In the spring of 2010, Ephraim McDowell Regional Medical Center began the journey to attain Magnet
Excellence®, a designation that means that we are creating and sustaining a culture of nursing
excellence. The Magnet journey is an arduous, time-consuming and culture-changing effort that may
take five or more years to complete. The requirements of Magnet are based on scientific evidence
of the steps that result in reduced nursing turnover, improved nursing satisfaction and excellence in
nursing practice. Meeting Magnet status requires nursing management, nursing Associates and many
other leaders and organization Associates to work together to accomplish the goals.

To achieve Magnet recognition, we must accomplish five Magnet hospital components:

• Transformational leadership must be evidenced. This means that leadership has "transformed"
  the nursing organization by setting a vision and values that emphasize the importance of nursing
  and worked with nursing Associates and others to accomplish it.
• Associates must experience structural empowerment. This means that nursing Associates have
  a "voice" in decisions that have to do with how they practice nursing. This is commonly referred
  to as "shared governance" and there are councils or groups where nurses can go to make
  themselves heard.
• Nurses must accomplish exemplary professional practice. This means that nurses practice high
  quality nursing care.
• The nursing division must accomplish new nursing knowledge, innovation and improvements.
  This means that nursing Associates participate in studies or other efforts to make improvements
  in nursing care.
• The organization must be able to demonstrate empirical quality results. This means that the
  outcomes of nursing care are measured and compare favorably to standards. These are such
  things as the number of pressure ulcers our patients develop when in our hospital or the number
  of times our patients get an infection.

What have we done and what will we do?

An ad hoc group of RN staff nurse Associates completed a Magnet gap analysis of Ephraim McDowell
Regional Medical Center nursing, which identified that EMRMC met 26 standards. In response to that
gap analysis, the Nurse Retention Council was modified to include members of the Magnet ad hoc Gap
Analysis Committee. This council began efforts to transform the existing nursing culture and to conduct
activities to ensure that Magnet standards are met.

Important things we have completed as part of our Magnet journey include developing a nursing
professional practice model, developing and implementing a nursing shared governance model and
implementing quality measurement and improvement with the National Database of Nursing Quality
Indicators (NDNQI).

In addition, regular communication about the Magnet journey is included as "Magnet in a Minute"
articles in the System F.I.R.S.T. newsletter as well as information on the Ephraim McDowell Health
intranet site.