CHIEF NURSING OFFICER

Overview

The Chief Nursing Officer is the designated nursing leader responsible for providing the overall leadership and direction for Nursing throughout the facility.  The Chief Nursing Officer participates with board members, administration, medical staff, and clinical areas in developing the hospital’s mission goals, strategic direction, and financial and operations plan for the nursing division.  The Chief Nursing Officer has 24-hour/ 7 days a week responsibility and accountability for planning, organizing, developing, directing, coordinating, and evaluating the human and material resources necessary for quality patient care and effective nursing operations.  The Chief Nursing Officer is responsible for ensuring that nursing service staff participate in implementing the applicable processes in the other patient care and organization-wide functions.  The Chief Nursing Officer participates in assessing the environment, forecasting trends, transmitting values, communicating ideas, developing and implementing standards and initiating programs and systems. 

Responsibilities

  

1

Develops organization-wide patient care programs, policies, and procedures that describe how patients’ nursing care needs are assessed, evaluated, and met through the delivery of nursing care

2

Develops and implements the organization’s plans for providing nursing care.

3

Participates with leaders from the governing body, management, medical staff, and clinical areas in the organization’s decision-making structures and processes.

4

Implements an effective, ongoing program to measure, assess, and improve the quality of nursing care delivered to patients. 

5

Participates with leaders from the governing body, management, medical staff, and clinical areas in the development and implementation of the Hospital's mission, goals and objectives.

6

Participates as a member of the Hospital administrative team ( A-Team) in developing and designing Hospital policy and managing Hospital operations. 

7

Assumes leadership in the refinement and implementation of the nursing philosophy, objectives, and plan for nursing care delivery.

8

Provides management feedback mechanisms which enhance decision making, motivation, and control capabilities of nursing managers, staff, patients, and significant others.

9

Provides leadership in new clinical program development implementation and evaluation.  Acts as a consultant in area(s) of expertise.

10

Facilitates goal attainment.  Evaluates progress regarding goal attainment and program development/implementation.  Revises plans and programs as necessary.  

11

Participates as an administrator on-call as scheduled. 

12

Directs the development of hospital-wide nursing care programs, policies, procedures, Standards of patient care, and Standards of Nursing practice that describe how the nursing care needs of patients, including age related, spiritual and cultural care needs, are assessed, evaluated and met.

13

Assures coordination of patient care with other Hospital departments as appropriate.

14

Promotes quality patient care, nursing services, including nursing care, are provided on a continuous basis, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to those patients requiring such care and service and monitors nursing services for each patient’s status and coordinate the provision of nursing care while assisting other professionals in implementing their plans of care.

15

Supports design, implementation, and evaluation of appropriate delivery of care models for patients.

16

Collaborates with leaders from the governing body, management, medical staff, and clinical areas in planning, promoting, and conducting hospital-wide quality monitoring and improvement activities. 

17

Promotes the quality of patient care and continuous quality improvement through multidisciplinary approaches.  

18

Measures, assesses, and improves patient care outcomes achieved through developing and implementing nursing standards of patient care and nursing standards of practice.

19

Ensures the areas of responsibility meet the external accreditation, regulatory, and licensing requirements.

20

Implements the finding of current research from nursing and other literature into the policies and procedures governing the provision of nursing care. 

21

Facilitates development and implementation of the annual nursing recruitment and retention program.

22

Applies organizational knowledge and skills to design and implement structure and culture that promotes participation and collaboration.  

23

Ensures that the objective measures of job-related performance are applied to promote development and evaluate performance and competencies o