Originally posted 03-19-10: Lorry talks with Catherine Knox, MS, RN, CCHP-RN, about the original revision of the Scope and Standards for Correctional Nursing. Catherine shares her start to correctional nursing practice over 30 years ago. Like so many of us, she is an ‘accidental’ correctional nurse. Don’t miss the interesting way she found out about our hidden specialty.

Standards Define the Specialty

The correctional nursing standards are broad parameters defining our specialty area of practice that transcend geographic location (south, east, west, midwest), type of employer (public/private, jail, prison, detention center), and the various populations served in correctional health care (sentenced, unsentenced, juvenile, female etc.).  The standards define who, what, where, when, why and how of correctional nursing practice.

The ANA standards are used to:

• inform nurses and others about correctional nursing practice
• guide nurse’s day- to- day practice and resolve conflicts
• develop policy and procedure and other governance of  professional practice
• reflect on professional practice and plan improvement

Correctional nursing was first acknowledged as a specialty practice by the ANA in 1985.

Sixteen Standards

There are sixteen standards of correctional nursing practice in the current edition. The first six standards delineate the steps used in the nursing process. The next ten standards define the professional role of nurses in the correctional setting. The areas covered by the standards are listed in the table below.

Table 1: Scope & Standards of Practice for Correctional Nurses

Practice	Professional   Performance
1. Assessment	7. Ethics
2. Diagnosis	8. Education
3. Outcomes Identification	9. Evidence-Based Practice and Research
4. Planning	10. Quality of Practice
5. Implementation	11. Communication
6. Evaluation	12. Leadership
	13. Collaboration
	14. Professional Practice Evaluation
	15. Resource Utilization
	16. Environmental Health

Competencies

Each standard is further defined by the competencies registered nurses and graduate-level prepared or advanced practice registered nurses (APRN) are expected to demonstrate in meeting the standard. Competency is defined as the integration of knowledge, skills, abilities, and judgment needed to achieve an expected level of performance. The registered nurse is responsible for maintaining professional competence and accountable for each of the decisions made in their nursing practice.

Using the Standards

Catherine talks about ways to use the standards in correctional practice in this podcast episode.

Are you using the standards in your setting? Share your experiences in the comments section of this post.