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Biennial convention 'an enriching and unique experience'
Gemma Lau, recipient of an Edith Anderson Leadership Education Grant to attend the convention in Baltimore, expresses appreciation for the opportunity to network with nurse leaders. I am very honored to be a recipient of the prestigious Edith Anderson Leadership Education Grant that has enabled me to participate in the convention at Baltimore. This was the first time I attended a biennial convention of Sigma Theta Tau International. It was an amazing experience to network with nurses from more than 30 countries who shared the same enthusiasm in pursuing excellence and scholarship in nursing. Networking was made possible through the preconference “SpeedConnect,” a networking lunch, as well as oral and poster presentations. I talked to many successful and well-known nurse researchers, scholars, writers, authors, practicing nurse clinicians and educators who shared my area of interest and who could be mentors for me in the future. I found the special session “Publish or Perish,” given by Jo Rycroft-Malone, Susan Gennaro and Bernadette Mazurek, especially valuable in providing useful information and helpful suggestions for writing and submitting articles for publication. Most exciting of all, two of my colleagues and I were able to present a literature review titled “Ventilated Association Pneumonia-Bundled Care.” We were honored and excited to share the result of our work in Canada with other nursing colleagues on an international level. The warm and positive feedback we received reassures us of our direction as we continue to pursue nursing excellence, and we were encouraged to submit our literature review for research funding and publication. The keynote presentation by Anne Ryder titled “Power, peace and perseverance: Lessons learned from Mother Teresa,” was heartwarming and a genuine tribute to the work of nurses. I found it inspiring and affirming to be reminded that the kindness and basic care given by nurses every day touch peoples’ hearts and make such a difference. Of particular interest to me was a symposium titled “Improving outcomes of preterms and parents with the COPE Program: Explanatory effects, cost outcomes and implementation strategies.” The COPE program is an educational/behavioral program for parents of preterms to reduce stress and improve coping behavior. The program, researched for more than 12 years, has been shown to reduce hospital length of stay and anxiety in parenting preterm infants up to age 3. The program, which is reproducible and capable of being generalized, would be an invaluable resource for our children’s hospital in Toronto, Canada. I found the convention an enriching and unique experience because of the opportunities it provided to directly network with nursing leaders, educators, writers and publishers. It was rewarding to be immersed in a global community where nursing knowledge, research and scholarship bond and draw nurses together for the purpose of collaborating on nursing and health issues. Edith Anderson Leadership Education grants are made possible as a result of donations to Sigma Theta Tau International Foundation for Nursing’s leadership endowment. |
