It's been a tough few years for nurses, but - as this year's International Nurses Day approaches - Professor Victoria Traynor is optimistic about the future.
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The veteran educator and nurse, who has spent her career improving aged care nursing, has just been appointed to the national Aged Care Quality and Safety Advisory Council.
As a a recognised leader in gerontological nursing who has achieved significant policy and practice changes in aged care through her research and teaching, she hopes to bring a much-needed nursing perspective to the committee.
"In Australia, aged care services are regulated by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission, and they have an advisory council who meets approximately six to eight times a year to provide advice to the commission about how to ensure that the commission is contemporary and is providing a good service to older Australians," she said.
"Older people who receive aged care services are probably the most vulnerable in our community because they're the ones with health and social problems, and they need to support to live their best life."
She said a nursing perspective has not always been considered in aged care, but changes in the way people access those services had made it vital.
"Often the people at the very top aren't nurses - they're expert business managers with understanding of health and aged care. But they're not clinicians by background," she said.
She said there had been a positive shift towards more home-like care in the 1980s, under the Hawke Government, when care became less institutionalised and more social, with lifestyle needs emphasised.
"But over time, older people who move into a nursing home are experiencing high levels of health care problems and need high level nursing," she said.
"So there's an imbalance between what skills the staff have and what the older people receiving the care need. In the past, people might move into a nursing home and be quite well for a few years, and then they might experience health problems.
"But now older people go into a nursing home at a much later stage, it's more likely that dementia will have a really big impact on them, and it usually means that their families can can no longer look after them in their own home.
"They have really highly complex nursing needs, a that's why we need to get the balance right to have more highly skilled nurses."
Prof Traynor said its was a pivotal time for aged care in Australia with the recommendations of the 2021 Royal Commission into the Quality and Safety of Aged Care being implemented.
"It is truly an honour to be appointed to the Advisory Council and have the opportunity to contribute at a national level," she said.
'We know nurses could do so much more'
With International Nurses' Day to be held on May 12, Prof Traynor said it was a good time to highlight the moves afoot to expand the role of nursing in the health system, giving nurses more powers and making use of experienced nurse practitioners.
"We know nurses could do so much more, but currently we're restricted by the legislation and our legislated scope of practise," she said.
"We're at a watershed moment where the scope of practise for the registered nurse is being reviewed - so registered nurses will be able to work to their advanced skill level and then the other piece of work that's going on is trying to improve the increase number of nurse practitioners."
She said this tied in to the theme of this year's nurse's day, which focuses on the economic power of nursing and recognises that nurses can improve the health of a nation.
"If nurses are enabled to have a broader role, we'll be able to have that impact on health, because we span the whole of the health journey," she said.
Despite disputes over nurses pay and workforce shortages, and talk to burnout among the workforce, Prof Traynor said she was optimistic.
I think the appetite for change is here - and if junior nurses can see different types of careers, then I think they would be more likely to stay in nursing," she said.
She said she hoped to promote the image of gerontological nursing, making it an attractive career for highly skilled nurses.
"When I was working as a nurse, there were definitely no nurse practitioners in aged care - but in the future, if you have got that passion for working for older people or any type of nursing, the different career options are going to be broader," she said.