Resources

Community nurses are well placed to provide information about travel to people living with a stoma. Although much of the advice seems like common sense, learning to live with a stoma and adapt the stoma into lifestyles can be difficult. Patients often want advice and reassurance that they can travel — be this on foot, by car, boat or aeroplane. There is a great deal of information on the internet from support groups, which is often reviewed by healthcare professionals and people living with a stoma to ensure accuracy. There is also information available from stoma appliance manufacturers and dispensers on their websites. Healthcare professionals need to advocate caution in using other sites that may be the opinion of just one person and may not offer a balanced view. However, in general, community nurses can encourage travelling as a safe and enjoyable way to live after stoma forming surgery.

Here, Georgina Ritchie, director of education, Accelerate CIC, explains why she and colleagues decided to write a book on lower limb and leg ulcer management using a Q&A approach in order to tease out and explore the most relevant themes in this area of practice. The individual authors for each chapter are all experts in their field, ensuring comprehensive coverage of the topics. This article gives an overview of each chapter and offers JCN readers a special 30% discount code to buy a copy.

This month we have an extremely interesting and thought provoking 'Community matters' piece. Please take some of your precious time to read and digest.

It’s a famous maxim that the definition of insanity is repeating the same action over and over while expecting a different result.

Reluctant as we are at JCN to accuse the government of succumbing to collective madness, it is hard to reconcile the deluge of policy documents stating that care needs to be moved away from hospitals and into the community, with the fact that primary care services still appear woefully underfunded. While health ministers talk endlessly about prevention and health promotion, community and district nurses leave in their droves through burn-out and lack of opportunity, and patients with complex needs continue to take up acute beds, leaving hospitals oversubscribed with chronically ill patients who can’t be discharged.

Last November, the Nature Food journal published an article stating that life expectancy in the UK can be increased by up to 10 years by sustained adherence to a healthier diet (Fadnes et al, 2023). This immediately caught the author’s attention. If we all are clear that healthy foods are the cornerstone of having longer, healthier and more dignified lives, why is the government not prioritising making healthy food accessible to people?

The Queen’s Nursing Institute (QNI) is rebranding its leadership programme for experienced nurses working in the community, primary care and social care.

The Ambition to Lead Programme (formerly known as Aspiring Nurse Leaders programme) is also open to allied health professionals (AHPs), as well as nurses working in the community with a minimum of five years of experience.

After decades as the Cinderella service, rehabilitation is now increasingly talked about in the same breath as medicine and surgery. The Community Rehabilitation Alliance (CRA), which the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy (CSP) convenes and co-chairs, has used the power of more than 60 health interest groups to bring about this change and set the scene for future transformation. Here, Tamsin Starr showcases its achievements and future plans.

When caring for people with venous leg ulceration, exudate management is commonly seen as one of the main challenges for clinicians. However, unfortunately, the reason for this wound-related symptom is often not identified or fully understood and therefore the clinical interventions necessary to address the problem are not implemented (Tickle, 2016). This results in people living with wounds that are failing to heal and producing a volume of exudate that has a significant impact on their quality of life (Cunha et al, 2017). Commonly, the words ‘leaky legs’ or ‘wet legs’ are documented in patient notes as the presenting problem — this is not a clinical diagnosis; it is a symptom of an underlying condition which more than likely is venous disease. Unless this is recognised and treated correctly, those ‘leaky legs’ will continue to be a problem and potentially could have a devastating impact on the patient. It is therefore important to have a good understanding of venous disease as well as the role that exudate plays in wound healing, from initial wounding, through the stages of healing, and when (and why) it becomes a problem.