Making leaders out of student learning disability nurses
Academics and lecturers have a mandate to develop future leaders in nursing students. The role of the educators is not only about producing graduate nurses but to inspire them to be leaders of the services, services which, as the current pandemic has shown, are evolving every day. The pandemic itself has taught humanity so many lessons, both good and bad, depending on where one is standing when they decide. When lecturers do their job, they are confident that their goals come to fruition when students graduate and go on to become caring and responsible nurses with clinical reasoning skills who can improve outcomes in complex healthcare systems.
At this time of significant service change, as dictated by the evolution of humanity, advancement of technology and a new generation of student nurses in the classroom it is vital that the learning disability nursing profession stays ahead of the game as well and not lag behind the other three fields. We need to ensure that our field has strong and visible leaders who will continue to address health inequalities among people with learning disabilities. Streamlining services, designing them to be fit for purpose and to meet the needs of an ever- growing population, albeit within one of the smallest fields is a top priority. The pandemic has had a final word about the service delivery that has been the norm for many years. Before lockdown in March 2020, there were many plans to start more services based in buildings and other structures. Little did we know that social distancing rules, isolation, shielding, wearing masks and other forms of personal protective equipment would have reverberations across our service delivery. These have impacted on people with learning disabilities in a very profound way. Jukes and Aspinall (2015) propagated that the current emphasis on leadership in learning disability care could be seen to be on the rise owing to the increasing number of critical incidents in recent history. Although the serious case review of Winterbourne View Hospital now seems years away, we have had other scandals that have continued to rock our filed to the very core, one recalls Whorlton Hall in County Durham and more recently Yew Trees Hospital in Essex in which the systematic abuse of people with learning disabilities seems to be pervasive.
Some steps have been taken to take Learning Disability nursing forward through the implementation of leadership strategies. This article aims to highlight how we can as academics and lecturers inculcate in our student nurses an attitude and desire for leadership. Undergraduate learning disability nursing should also be about developing a higher level of knowledge, and acquisition of skills that demonstrate excellence through an ability to translate and apply evidence-based practices yes but in this day and age where Covid19 has thrown us a curve ball, the responsibility of utilizing evidence based practices and translating them now more than ever no longer lies in what was done pre pandemic but in how we are adapting to the brand new untried and untested way of life. Student nurses have the opportunity now to capitalize on maximizing these opportunities and develop new interventions to support people with learning disabilities stuck at home, feeling lonely, deprived of their usual activities, and missing their friends. If people with learning disabilities are not offered sufficient and accessible information about Covid19 and how it has now altered their lives, then they cannot make appropriate decisions about what is important in their lives. One of the ways of addressing this is to share knowledge and experiences via real-time platforms such as Twitter. Twitter, has, of late, been the best platform that has in the past ten years or so, united some of the high-profile learning disability nurses and leaders whose contributions have transformed service delivery. At some point, they have to pass the baton to future nurses and what better ways and platforms to do that. A social media platform in which student nurses, nurses, academics, and lecturers share best practice including leadership post pandemic.
Jukes, M. and Aspinal S-L. (2015) Leadership and learning disability nursing British Journal of Nursing (24) 18