Pediatric Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice: A Unified Professional Effort

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In April 2008, the newly revised Pediatric Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice will be unveiled at the conferences of Society of Pediatric Nurses (SPN) in Denver and of the National Association of Pediatric Nursing Practitioners (NAPNAP) in Nashville. The purpose of this revised professional practice document is to describe and define the scope of pediatric nursing practice as it pertains to roles of pediatric nurses and pediatric nurse practitioners in the diverse settings wherein they provide care to infants, children, youth, and their families whether it be in hospital, clinic, community, or school settings. These standards have been devised to describe the practice of both generalist nurses with varied levels of educational preparation and advanced practice nurses with graduate degrees (masters or doctoral), such as clinical nurse specialists and acute and primary care pediatric nurse practitioners. Importantly, as well, this document can be used for regulatory and policy-making purposes to ensure that these authoritative statements are integrated as the framework for service, education, research, and policy development.

Beginning nearly 4 years ago, representatives of SPN and NAPNAP initiated efforts to jointly develop standards of practice that reflected the commonalities of practice of nurses who provided care to children and their families, yet whose roles and responsibilities of nursing practice varied. These new unified standards embody this original purpose. The revised unified standards are based upon the following documents: the Scope and Standards of Pediatric Nursing Practice (American Nurses Association (ANA) and SPN, 2003), the Scope and Standards of Practice: Pediatric Nurse Practitioner (PNP; NAPNAP, 2004), and Nursing: Scope & Standards of Practice (ANA, 2004).

During the past year, the work of revising the Pediatric Nursing Standards was based upon the unified efforts of SPN and NAPNAP. Beginning in May 2006, under the leadership of cochairs Dr. Martha Swartz of NAPNAP and Dr. Lynn Mohr of SPN, a joint work group was delegated the responsibility for crafting the first draft of the unified Pediatric Nursing Standards document. Later in July 2007, the draft of the work group was distributed to the Review Panel Work Group, composed of more than 20 SPN and NAPNAP members for additional review and input. This subsequent draft revision was posted on the Web sites of SPN, NAPNAP, and ANA for broader distribution to more than 30 organizations. These comments were integrated into the final draft of the Standards document.

The 2008 version of the Pediatric Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice contains three sections: Introduction, Scope of Practice, and Standards of Practice. The Introduction section provides background information on the development of the document itself and the description of the collaborative efforts of SPN and NAPNAP to facilitate this effort. The Scope of Practice portion of the document (Standards 1 to 6) addresses the clinical components of pediatric nursing practice of generalist and advanced practice nurses. For as Dr. Sandra Mott (personal communication, December 14, 2007), the President of SPN under whose leadership this effort was undertaken, stated: “A scope of practice statement describes the who, what, where, when, why, and how of nursing practice.” The Standards of Practice explicate the professional standards of practice (Standards 7 to 16). Dr. Mott (personal communication, December 14, 2007) described the Standards as the “authoritative statements that describe the responsibilities for which nurses are accountable.” The sixteen standards are:

These standards, borne out of the collaborative effort of SPN and NAPNAP, represent the importance and strengths of professional partnerships not only for the benefit of pediatric nursing professionals but also, most importantly, for the benefit of the infants, children, youth, and families who are cared for by us.

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References 

1. American Nurses Association . Nursing: Scope and standards of practice. Silver Spring, MD: Author; 2004;
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2. American Nurses Association  Society of Pediatric Nurses. Scope and standards of pediatric nursing practice. Silver Spring, MD: American Nurses Association; 2003;
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3. National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners . Scope and standards of practice: Pediatric nurse practitioner (PNP). Cherry Hill, NJ: Author; 2004;
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