A hospital/school science fair mentoring program for middle school students.

The Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and the James P. Timilty Middle School established a partnership to enhance science education, promote faculty development, and improve the health status and academic performance of all Timilty students. This article describes one of the Partnership's Science Connection programs, the Science Fair Mentoring Program, designed to enhance middle school science education, inform urban early adolescents about professions in the health field, inspire them to pursue postsecondary study in the health sciences, and prepare them for rigorous academic work in high school. In this program, hospital-based clinical and research staff mentor young adolescent students. The authors describe the planning, implementation, and evaluation of the Science Fair Mentoring Program as an innovative learning experience.

The Harvard Nursing Research Institute's conference summary.

The Harvard Nursing Research Institute organized a national invitational conference on executive nursing leadership in major teaching hospitals and academic health centers. The conference brought together many of the nation's eminent nurse executives and other prominent individuals in healthcare to analyze the unique and complex challenges facing these organizations, expose participants to other perspectives, and articulate specific aims and strategies that might be taken to increase their effectiveness in leading the nursing profession's efforts to shape the ongoing transformation of the healthcare system.

A century of progress: nursing quality improvement at the Mount Sinai Medical Center.

Since The Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City began delivering care in the mid 1800s, the medical services and, shortly thereafter, the nursing service have consistently given priority to improving patient care. Through the decades of the late 19th and 20th centuries, the Department of Nursing has remained current with the evolving concept of quality improvement. A historical overview of key elements in the evolution of quality improvement in nursing is presented.

Quality improvement in action: a falls prevention and management program.

A departmental program for falls prevention and management, initiated in 1987, and arising out of the awareness of the economic, physical, and psychological effects of falls in hospitalized patients, has been described. Given the results outlined, there is no doubt that the efforts applied in the area of falls prevention have been extremely worthwhile in affecting major quality improvements in patient care. The benefits of the falls prevention program include a reduction in the incidence of falls as well as an increased awareness by staff, patients, and families of the importance of monitoring patients at risk for falls.

Physician-nurse collegiality in the medical school curriculum: exploratory workshop and student questionnaire.

Medical education is the key to improvements in physician-nurse relationships and communication. The results of a workshop for second-year medical students on collegiality organized by The Mount Sinai Hospital Department of Nursing and the Mount Sinai School of Medicine are presented. The workshop follow-up roundtable discussion is summarized and the results of a survey of medical students' perception of professional nursing are presented.

Mentor program for high school students.

As the nation grapples with the latest shortage of registered professional nurses, a creative solution, with an eye toward nursing in the 21st century, is the Mentor Program in Nursing for high school students at The Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City. The registered professional nurses on staff at the medical center have made a commitment to this program as a way of encouraging a continuous supply of future nurses.

Revised discharge form improves continuity of care.

A well-devised patient discharge form can help to alleviate chart retrieval problems at hospital clinics and can get patients involved in their own health care. The discharge form developed at The Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City, has been especially helpful to physicians because the form contains essential information about patients that can be used when a chart is unavailable.