Nurse Case

Nursing profession is the largest force in health care system holding the central role as health care providers. Our people's health depends on competent and highly educated nurses. Nursing profession needs dynamic, visionary, educated and committed leaders who can protect the public health rights through productive input in national health policy. Effective nursing leaders also ensure the quality nursing education for safe nursing practice. In addition they advocate for the public and the professional's rights. Effective nursing leadership supports the collaborative, innovative and evidence based work environment that helps nurses to feel respected and valued in their positions. According to Huber (2006) "leader use their power to bring teams together, spark innovation, create positive communication and drive forward toward group goals (p.4)." Nursing leadership must possess these characteristics. Especially nursing leaders who run professional organizations at national level have to acquire these characteristics. In our country health care system is decentralized at provincial level. So nursing leadership comprises provincial, federal and professional bodies at national level. "Director General Nursing" is the highest rank in each of the four provinces responsible for health and nursing matters in their particular area. Where as in federal "Nursing Advisor" is the top position directly working with ministry of health in close coordination with other nurse leaders. Likewise, professional bodies are the most important pillars of the nursing profession at national level in any of the country. These are comprised of nursing council, nursing association and nursing union. The role of these professional bodies slightly varies country to country depending on their scope of responsibilities and need of the time. In Pakistan we have two professional bodies; Pakistan Nursing Council (PNC) and Pakistan Nursing Federation (PNF). While addressing the issue related to "Challenges of nursing leadership" I will be focusing on professional bodies PNC & PNF only, being the national level leadership. The purpose of this paper is to describe the challenges related to leadership at national level, identify the key issues and recommend strategies to resolve the issues.