New Global Regulatory Atlas Enhances Safe Nursing Practice

As the world grapples with a critical nursing shortage, it’s essential that we, as nursing and health care leaders, know all we can about the current state of nursing practice in our regions and countries. How many nurses are practicing? Who makes the laws that govern their practice? Where do they work? Who regulates their work environment?

This information, and more, is now at our fingertips. The National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) recently introduced its new, updated Global Regulatory Atlas – a comprehensive free online compendium of nursing regulation worldwide.

With just a few clicks, anyone – from nurses, researchers and educators to policymakers, regulators, legislators and consumers – can quickly access a wealth of data from more than 320 countries and regions representing 22 million nurses.

Content includes:

  • Governing bodies and their contact information
  • Laws and regulations for new nurses
  • Education, training, and authorization-to-practice for 385 different nursing types
  • Accreditation requirements for nursing education programs
  • Disciplinary procedures for nurse conduct or competency issues
  • Nursing telehealth practices and governance

The Global Regulatory Atlas is an update of NCSBN’s 2018 version, the first complete resource on nursing regulation worldwide. The new atlas is bigger, easier to use, and offers more real-time data. NCSBN created it with input from health care regulators around the globe. Nurses can use it to view policies and regulations in countries where they might want to work; researchers can use it to find data; policymakers can use it to find regulatory and legislative details; health care leaders can use it to ensure their nurses are meeting care standards; and the public can use it to ensure the care they receive is safe.

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, the global supply of nurses was shrinking. Once the crisis hit, the gap between projected supply and demand widened exponentially¹. In seeking solutions to this growing nursing workforce crisis, resources such as the Global Regulatory Atlas are more important than ever to provide key information, we can use to enhance safe nursing practice and ensure public safety worldwide.

 

References

¹ https://www.icn.ch/news/icn-report-says-shortage-nurses-global-health-emergency, International Council of Nurses, accessed 9.10.23.

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