The Association’s professional team answer your questions about professional issues, your rights and responsibilities.
Do I have professional obligations to escalate concerns about workloads and staffing levels or skill mix?
As nurses and midwives, we must comply with the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia’s (NMBA’s) professional standards, which outline the practice and behaviour expected of nurses and midwives. The NMBA professional practice frameworks include the codes of conduct, standards for practice, the decision-making framework, and the codes of ethics.
Professional and safe practice
is at the heart of our professional obligations. We all have a professional obligation to evaluate our practice environment and to take appropriate action to address the factors that compromise care.
Codes and standards require that nurses and midwives take action if they believe staffing levels and/or skill mix is inadequate for them to be able to provide safe and professional
care. This obligation to act applies to all nurses and midwives.
It includes those working in a direct or non-clinical relationship with patients or
clients, working in management, administration, education, research, advisory, regulatory, policy development roles, or other roles that impact on safe, effective delivery of services.
Could I “lose my registration” for participating in certain types of industrial action?
The NMBA or a tribunal may suspend a nurse or midwife as a form of immediate action in the public interest, if it believes the nurse or midwife presents a serious and immediate risk to public and that a suspension is
the proportionate way to address that risk until the matter has been resolved.
It is very unlikely that participating in industrial action that is focused on improving patient safety would be viewed as a serious and immediate risk to public.
I feel that the industrial action may impact essential care – what is your advice about the ethics of this?
We know that for some time, far too many nurses and midwives in NSW have been enduring workloads that make
it impossible for them to provide care that is person-centred and evidence-based. There are simply not enough staff to attend to every patient relying on us.
The overarching principle of industrial action is to draw attention to the campaign and to highlight how valuable nurses and midwives are to the NSW health system. One form of industrial action is work bans.
These are typically specific to the work environment and are typically not related to direct patient care. Examples of work bans might include not touching linen bags, or not cleaning beds. When undertaking these bans, the message members are trying to send is ‘Given the unsafe staffing levels, we are focusing on nursing and midwifery care and prioritising more urgent clinical issues.’
We understand that making the decision to be active in an industrial campaign is easy for some and not so easy for others.
The question for all members is whether it is more ethical to allow the status quo, or to act to change the status quo. If we choose to act, we should always do so in a way that ensures life-preserving care is maintained.