Magnet Certification Journey
Gloria Carmona
NUR/598
February 26, 2014
Maureen Johnson

Magnet Certification Journey
Providing excellent patient care is the goal established for every nurse. However, not every nurse understands the true meaning of providing excellent patient care. Incorporating evidence –based practice (EBP) is another concept that not all nurses understand or desire. The purpose of this paper is to describe how research utilization proposals are congruent with the forces of the American Nurses’ Credentialing Center (ANCC) Magnet certification.
It is a challenge for every nurse leader to create, foster, and underpin a clinical environment where nursing research and EBP is incorporated into both delivery of care and the groundwork for system-wide decision making. Implementing new evidence-focused policies and procedures to improve patient outcomes is a well-known challenge. Non master’s degree prepared nurses are more task oriented and do not venture into the world of EBP. Master’s degree prepared nurses for the most part incorporate EBP in daily practice. This improves the quality of patient care and delivery of cost-effective nursing service. However, because of time constraint and lack of education on understanding research articles, the nurses’ level of involvement to integrate best research evidence with clinical practice may be compromised.
Magnet certification journey is considered by health care facilities as a journey of excellence (McHugh et al., 2013). The benefits of a Magnet journey are substantial because they provide consumers with a set of standards to effectively measure the quality of care that they receive (American Nurses Credentialing Center, 2014). Magnet designation attracts highly qualified clinicians, which is why the majority of nurses gears toward earning an advanced degree in nursing. Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) focuses on advancing nursing as a whole through the use of technology, evidence-based practice, individualization of care, interdisciplinary leadership, and outcome assessment (University of Phoenix, 2013). Moreover, MSN provides an environment that secures resources such as development of EBP awareness activities and nursing research forums, needed to create a culture where EBP is a significant element of professional practice. MSN allows opportunities to bridge research and practice through the application of research findings into nursing care.
It is apparent that the dissemination of EBP findings such as the findings from the nursing research that linked proton pump inhibitors (PPI) therapy and clostridium difficile infection (CDI) are essential in any clinical setting. The concept of providing excellent patient care is the backbone of many nursing research utilization project proposal. Diabetic patients and psychiatric patients in medical floors will benefit from research studies that not only seek out the link between knowledgeable nurses and better patient outcomes, but that also puts EBP findings into practice