Children's Hospital Association: How 2 Children's Hospitals Earned Nursing's Top Honor a record 6 Times in a Row
Four years. A four-day site visit. One hundred four questions.
That’s the minimum it takes for a hospital to even be considered for Magnet designation.
And those questions aren’t multiple choice. All 104 require essays, including documentation and outcomes behind the stories of nursing excellence.
Just 9% of U.S. hospitals have received this honor from the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC).
Less than 1% of them have earned the prestigious Magnet designation six times. Among them, only two pediatric hospitals: Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago and Children’s Mercy Kansas City.
Everyday excellence
Nursing leaders responsible for the hefty applications say they’ve been successful because recognition follows the work at their hospitals, rather than driving it.
“We don’t do things for Magnet. We achieve Magnet because of the things we do, which actually makes my job a lot easier,” said Paula Blizzard, RN, Children’s Mercy’s senior director of nursing excellence. “Instead of saying ‘oh, we have a gap in the application here; we’ve got to throw a project together,’ we’re able to look and see what great things our nurses are already doing at the bedside every day. And then I get to tell those stories to the appraisers.”
Read the full article via the Children's Hospital Association