This much needed Adult/Gerontological Nurse Practitioner (AGNP) specific textbook provides comprehensive, evidenced-based practice approaches to both common and complex health issues AGNP’s may face in primary care. Many of the chapters are written by practicing clinicians; their expertise is an essential contribution that integrates the best available evidence with a current clinical practice application and a focus on high quality, cost-efficient, person/family-centered, safe care. An innovative feature of this textbook is the way it is organized with five distinct sections that incorporate the entirety of the AGNP role to include fundamental concepts of AGNP practice, AGNP practice in various primary care practice settings, special health conditions for adolescents and older adults, practice-wide systems management, and disease specific conditions. Many providers anticipate an AGNP to have the basic skills of billing when they are hired, so this chapter prepares the AGNP to have basic information that can be made more specific to their practice. Also unique is the focus on patient safety and quality improvement starting with a dedicated chapter to these topics but also with these skills applied in the chapters on common health conditions. The book is organized into five parts. Part 1 details the Fundamental Concepts such as healthy aging, person-centered care, patient safety and quality improvement, interprofessional teams/team-based care, care coordination, and promoting wellness in AGNPs. Part II is focused on the AGNP role across healthcare settings, concepts in palliative and end-of-life care, and the role of AGNPs in disasters. Part III examines the explicit health issues for older adults and adolescents. Part IV provides a unique view of ensuring that AGNPs are ready for practice and the practice environment. Part V includes chapters that focus on common health conditions the AGNP may encounter in primary care no matter the setting.

This is a valuable textbook and resource for those serving the healthcare needs in rural and frontier areas. It focuses on the health of rural dwellers, the provision of healthcare in rural settings, and the skills and knowledge required for effective nursing practice, education, and research within this context. The sixth edition contains ten new chapters, content on the effect of the coronavirus (COVID-19) on rural populations, seminal chapters on Rural Nursing Theory and rural nursing, and updated chapters retained from previous editions. The text is divided into five sections. Section 1 focuses on theory and research and presents an overview of the theory development process and the seminal work on Rural Nursing Theory. It includes rural nursing concepts, and chapters on conducting research in rural and frontier settings. Section 2 describes the nature and scope of rural nursing practice and expands one’s understanding of the experiences of rural nurses and nurse practitioners. Section 3 focuses on healthcare delivery in rural settings and includes chapters on health behavior, suicide, nurses as primary care providers, emergency services, telehealth, palliative care, and complementary and alternative therapy use by rural dwellers. Section 4 addresses education and provides insight into learning opportunities in rural clinical settings; interprofessional, collaborative, and transcultural service-learning education; and the skills and competencies nurses and nurse practitioners need to care for rural populations. Section 5 focuses on the care of select vulnerable populations including migrant and seasonal workers, neonates experiencing opiate withdrawal, palliative and end-of-life care for American Indians, and the conduct of research with vulnerable populations. The book highlights the realities of rural nursing from bedside to advanced practice. It not only identifies the challenges, but also highlights opportunities in rural healthcare and innovative practice.

This book makes a timely and essential contribution to professional training and is a welcome resource for those dedicated to improving long-term care services for older adults. It reflects the way society views the growing elderly population and the implications of this demographic trend for the field of long-term care. Long-term care continues to be the fastest growing segment of the healthcare industry; there is a critical need to educate and train a core of professional personnel with the knowledge and skills to address the complex issues in aging, health, and human services. The book aims to provide a useful reference of content information, effective practices, and model programs in elder care related to assisted living/residential care (AL/RC) administration. Similar to the first edition, this book is based on the core competencies required to operate assisted living communities. It contains five parts; each part focuses on a core competency in assisted living administration such as organizational management, human resources management, business and financial management, environmental management, and resident care management. The book embraces chapter features such as useful learning objectives, case studies, effective practices, and model programs in elder care that are relevant to assisted living communities. New chapters in this edition address topics such as inter-professional practice; home- and community-based services; information and communication technology; LGBTQ and other diverse groups; memory care; and palliative and hospice care. Importantly, the book is based on core competencies required to operate assisted living communities, and each of its five parts focuses on a core competency (i.e., domain of practice). The book serves as a useful reference for professionals who are associated with AL/RC organizations. It can also function as a primary textbook for undergraduate and graduate courses in gerontology, health administration, and long-term care administration that focus on assisted living/residential care administration.

This third edition, has been written as a reference and certification test review guide for registered nurse (RNs) preparing for gerontological certification. It is also a useful text for students who are studying gerontology, teachers preparing gerontology classes, and RNs working with older adults. The book presents information about preparing for the certification exam, a comprehensive compilation of content specific to gerontology, and a test bank of questions specifically developed for the RN preparing for certification in gerontology. It focuses on topics specific to the aging population, such as demographics, myths about aging, theories of aging and nursing, communication skills geared for the older adult, teaching–learning principles that work well with older adults, and the history of gerontological nursing. The book identifies the health promotion needs of elders, such as nutrition, exercise, primary and secondary prevention strategies, and alternative and complementary healthcare practices used with older adults. It describes the environment, including safety and security, relocation, transportation, the importance of space, community-based resources, and residential facilities. It discusses spirituality and dying with special attention to advance directives, hospice and palliative care, and the grieving process. The book describes the acute and chronic physical illnesses most frequently experienced by older adults and discusses the cognitive and psychological disorders experienced by elders, including dementia, delirium, and depression. It covers common medications used by older adults, as well as discussions about polypharmacy, issues related to pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics, noncompliance, and adverse drug effects. It also discusses special topics such as pain, sexuality, and elder neglect and abuse, and covers descriptions of health policy issues and organizations that advocate for older adults. The book finally discusses the scope and standards of geriatric nursing practice relating to leadership and management, research, ethical and legal issues, and professional competency.

Revised and updated, this third edition continues its tradition of providing evidence-based approaches to the specific technical aspects of delivering radiation treatment. Easy to read and relevant to general practice, this popular pocket-sized manual leads radiation oncology trainees and clinicians through the basics of radiotherapy planning and delivery for all major malignancies in a step-by-step manner. Organized by body site or system, each chapter provides technical details and clinical updates to planning as a result of practice-changing paradigms as well as new and updated equipment and techniques. Specialized topics such as palliative radiotherapy and pediatric radiotherapy round out the final chapters. With over 40 new images in addition to detailed accounts of advances in the field, this highly anticipated third edition provides important updates while retaining the valued, practical features of the previous editions. Written by members of staff in the Department of Radiation Oncology at the Cleveland Clinic, this edition continues to be a valuable resource for training as well as a reliable quick reference for professionals in the field such as radiation therapists and technologists, radiation nurses, dosimetrists, physicists, and practicing physicians. It presents concise summaries including target definitions and dose constraints for planning all major disease sites, provides updated coverage of planning associated with stereotactic body radiation therapy for prostate, pancreas, and liver cancers, and includes over 190 full color images. It also outlines new practice standards for hypofractionated radiation therapy in breast and prostate cancers and explains specific technical aspects important for the appropriate clinical delivery of radiation treatment.

By focusing on the individual professional in relation to team health and success, this book shows how to develop high-quality, high-performing palliative care teams. It explores the types of providers involved in palliative care, their roles, possible conflicts, and the opportunity to amplify their work as a team while overcoming the stigma that may be attached to palliative care. The book focuses on the foundational role of communication in leadership, team building, and the delivery of patient care. Palliative care continues to be a rapidly growing area of medicine. The book is designed to help us avoid common pitfalls while starting a team or correct issues in an already formed palliative care team. Unlike most books about palliative care, the book is geared toward equipping practicing healthcare professionals or soon-to-be-practicing students with practical solutions for working within complex, multifaceted palliative care teams. Departing from the traditional foci of provider–patient rapport and pain and symptom management, the book offers pragmatic solutions to common organizational headaches and unique palliative care team issues by helping practitioners consider the intricacies of interdisciplinary team dynamics, occupational culture, and self-care in emotional, labor–intensive positions. While this book will be especially attractive for the working palliative care professional, it will also be a useful socialization tool for medical and nursing schools, as well as graduate communication and social work programs and advanced undergraduate courses in health communication, nursing, and sociology. The text’s driving theme is an emphasis on the foundational nature of communication for individual and collective performance within palliative care teams. The authors frame communication as constitutive; in other words, our unique experience in our organization is based on how we approach communication in our interpersonal, group, and organizational relationships.

This newly updated, quick-access guide for critical care nurses covers the most common admitting diagnoses and reviews their causes, signs and symptoms, and interventions. Critical care nursing requires astute assessment, adept communication, and the ability to multitask, as well as a high degree of adaptability. In the ICU, patient status and plan of care change constantly, presenting multifaceted problems for nurses and healthcare providers. This book provides the most current evidence-based guidelines and standards for the busy critical care nurse. Organized by body system, this reference presents the latest treatment modalities and provides quick access to lab values and hemodynamic parameters. Part I reviews the foundational aspects of critical care nursing, including the critical care environment, the electronic medical record, and specialty certifications for the critical care nurse. Part II progresses by body system to cover common procedures and interventions. Starting with neurological care and proceeding through each system, the chapters begin with an assessment and then provide the most common admitting diagnoses. Each diagnosis is presented with a cause, signs and symptoms, and interventions. Each chapter discusses the critical aspects of caring for a patient presenting with a specific diagnosis. Part III ends with patient- and family-centered care, discussing palliative directives and organ donation. The book provides quick access to essential information needed on a daily basis and includes Fast Facts boxes to help guide the reader.

This book provides clinicians from multiple disciplines the opportunity to examine key topics that can be practically considered for implementation into practice. It provides information from a wide variety of viewpoints that will enable individual team members to forge interdisciplinary approaches to care, assess current programs, develop strategies to improve the quality of care, and tailor new models of care for patients in need of palliative care services. The book spans all aspects of the clinical and compassionate care of patients, families, and caregivers. Written by experts from all clinical disciplines, including medical and surgical physicians, mental health professionals, nurses, therapists, and chaplains, it shows great respect for and gives voice to affected families and their babies. It addresses the multidimensional aspects of perinatal and neonatal palliative care. Encompassing the perspectives of neonatologists, maternal-fetal medicine and other physicians, neonatal and perinatal nurse practitioners, midwives, nurses in all sectors of perinatal care, and child life specialists, chaplains, social workers, genetic counselors, lactation consultants, and others, the book underscores the unique aspects of perinatal and neonatal palliative care, with a focus on improving quality of life, as well as comfort at the end of life. It describes healthcare for neonates and pregnant mothers, care and support of the family, planning and decision making, and effective support for grief and bereavement. It addresses all palliative and neonatal palliative care settings, including home care, and covers elements of comfort care, such as pain medication and oxygen. The book focuses on the prenatal period after diagnosis of the expected baby’s life-threatening condition. These include such topics as care of the mother, delivering devastating news, and advance care planning.

This book is offered to hospice and palliative care nurses to assist their preparation for taking the Certified Hospice and Palliative Nurse (CHPN^®) certification examination. Interest in demonstrating expertise through certification as a hospice and palliative care nurse has continually grown, as recognition of one's expertise brings not only professional satisfaction but also personal pride. Since this text is a practice and certification review for hospice and palliative care nurses preparing for the CHPN certification examination, the book follows the test outline offered by the Hospice and Palliative Credentialing Center. In seven sections, the book offers tips on test-taking, an outline of the CHPN certification examination, a review of life-limiting conditions in adult patients, a review of pain and symptom management, a review of education and advocacy in patient and family care, a review of practice issues, and a full-length practice test with answers and rationales. It also presents practice questions at the end of the chapters. This must-have study guide for nurses seeking to obtain CHPN status provides state-of-the-art information about all aspects of this specialty. It features 300 carefully selected Q&As that offer a detailed rationale for each question, along with tips and strategies to promote exam mastery and frequently asked questions about the exam. Brief topical reviews address hospice and palliative care nursing practice in all of its dimensions, including physical, spiritual, and psychosocial. The resource highlights information that forms the basis of end-of-life care, such as communication and family-centered care. Additionally, the book covers high-level skills used by hospice and palliative care nurses, such as drug and dosage conversion and the use of infusion therapy.

This book covers all dimensions of palliative care but with a special emphasis on primary palliative care. The book is organized into three parts comprising twenty two chapters. Part one provides the essential background and principles of supportive oncology and palliative care, including chapters on understanding the adult and pediatric patient and family illness experience, the roles and responsibilities of the palliative care team, and the art of the palliative care assessment interview. Part two covers symptom management and includes ten chapters considering the major physical and psychosocial symptoms a cancer patient may face—neurologic, cardiac, respiratory, gastrointestinal, genitourinary, psychiatric, sleep and fatigue, pain, and psychosocial and spiritual distress. Part three addresses special considerations and issues that an oncologist, physician, nurse or other healthcare provider often face in these settings, including chapters on intimacy, sexuality, and fertility issues, grief and bereavement, running a family meeting, care for the caregiver, and survivorship.