Development management for nursing administration
Heyden, R.; Luyas, G.; Henry, B.
Nursing and Health Care Official Publication of the National League for Nursing 11(4): 179-181
1990
ISSN/ISBN: 0276-5284 PMID: 2330139 Document Number: 371459
Development management, defined as the discipline for the study of managed social and economic change in developing nations, is applied to nursing administration in the primary care context. Only 3 U.S. universities offer international nursing management, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Texas, indicating a lack of curricula for foreign students as well as application of development management for problems at home. The developing nations, with all their differences, face strikingly similar problems in administration and nursing administration in particular: emphasis on tertiary hospitals, top-down hierarchies, undeveloped human resources, lack of high performance systems, lack of infrastructures for health service delivery, ineffective rural-urban links. Now the focus in development administration is on empowering all people, appropriate use of resources, cooperation between public and private sectors, and sustainability. It is important to emphasize developmental process rather than targets, and to work at the local level. Since 90% of people's health needs require nursing, not medical care, it is important that nurses be appointed to management positions and participate in national health services, that research on nursing education include primary health care. U.S. nursing training prepares nurses for dependent work in hospitals delegated by physicians, not for autonomous functioning in provision of primary health care or consultation and management. Even so, conditions in parts of the U.S. resemble those in developing countries. A basic annotated bibliography for transcultural, international and management applications to nursing is appended.