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The COVID-19 epidemic continues to spread, and frontline health professionals have unfortunately contracted this virus because of exposure while providing clinical care. Based on the painful experience of the previous SARS epidemic in Taiwan, nurses have adopted a standard of care for infection protection that incorporates early prevention and detection. However, international public health experts remain unable to control the infectivity and variability of the COVID19 virus, which increases the mental stress on frontline nurses when performing care. In this paper, which uses a medical center in the north of Taiwan as an example, JBI clinical guidelines, infection control experience, and nurses' awareness, perceived support, and self-efficacy are applied to suggest ways to improve epidemic prevention and mental construction, enhance nurses' psychological empowerment and refection, promote role identity in nursing and self-value, establish health team awareness, strengthen infection protection concepts, and integrate infection control concepts into the nursing models to develop effective standard operating procedures for epidemic prevention management and effectively prevent the spread of the virus and maintain public health.

Professional nursing organizations represent an important channel for the nursing profession to influence health policy, represent and protect the interests of nurses, and advocate for the further development of the profession. Facing the rapidly increasing aging population and emerging needs of long-term care in Taiwan, the Taiwan Nurses Association launched an integrated project to propose policy advice on the development of nursing in long-term care. In this paper, the relevant findings in the domestic and foreign literature are summarized to better define the role function and core competence of long-term care nurses. In addition, the current tasks, perceived competence, and training needs of nurses working in long term care settings are presented, and the consensus on various advocacy strategies are summarized. The findings presented in this study may be referenced when developing evidence-based policy recommendations related to education, practice, legal / regulatory amendments, and professional organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Achieving enhanced healthcare quality by participating in cross-disciplinary medical teams and providing specialized, precision nursing are core professional values of clinical nurse specialists (CNSs). Although CNSs are crucial in the healthcare field, the development of CNSs in Taiwan remains in its infancy. The Taiwan Nurses Association has already announced regulations related to professional frameworks and scope of practice for advanced practice nurses and has reached a preliminary consensus and plans on the definition, qualifications, and indicators of care for CNSs. The clinical application, job titles, and certification of the professional core values of CNSs require continuous and joint deliberation and development by professional nurse organizations. In this study, the results of empirical research into professional organizational frameworks and certification of CNSs in Europe, the United States, and Australia were used to derive a reference model for CNS education and training development for advanced practice nurse specialties in Taiwan. The fundamental elements of the roles and professional frameworks and feasible qualification certification systems were also explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of information technology has changed the world and allowed the innovation of nursing-care services. In recent years, the development of nursing informatics in Taiwan has been catching up with international trends and has been regarded positively by the international medical informatics community. The integration of information technology into medical care system has created the new nursing role of "informatics nurse." Although the certiication system and job descriptions for these nurses have become increasingly comprehensive in many nations, Taiwan remains in the early development stage in these regards. Taiwan informatics nurses continue to face unclear and inadequately stated role responsibilities and job titles, undeined training requirements, and a lack of a clear qualiication / certiication system. This paper introduces the role functions and professional growth of informatics nurses and introduces the framework for a certiication system in order to give to various medical and paramedical staffs a better understanding of informatics nursing and to recognize the important role played by informatics nurses in the process of healthcare informatics development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Gender Equality in Employment Act was enacted to protect gender equality in the workplace. Increasingly tight controls over operating costs by employers and the increasingly heavy workloads of nurses pose major challenges to the labor rights of female nurses. This article introduces the labor rights of female nurses as stated in relevant laws and regulations such as the Gender Equality in Employment Act, the Labor Standards Act, the Labor Insurance Act, Regulations on Leave-Taking for Workers, Regulations on Implementing Unpaid Parental Leave for Raising Children Pension Act, and the Employment Insurance Act. In addition, this paper introduces three judicial decisions that highlight domestic judicial practice with regard to labor rights in nursing. It is hoped that nurses may gain a better understanding of their rights and challenges from these judicial decisions. Finally, this article makes recommendations to help nurses overcome the difficulties in implementing labor rights. It is hoped that this article helps increase the general awareness among nurses of their labor rights and encourages nurses to pursue and secure their rightful labor rights from their employer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Taiwan Nurses Association (TWNA) is publishing a special centenary issue to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the association in 2014. For this issue, TWNA invited the author to write a review article that addresses the involvement of the TWNA in professional diplomacy and international exchange over the past century. The author reviews the history of both TWNA and the International Council of Nurses and introduces the contributions of the association in the ield of professional diplomacy and the positive contributions of many Taiwan nursing leaders to global healthcare and society. The purpose of the paper is to convey the traditions and experiences of TWNA forward to the next generation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of international nursing education in Taiwan is to prepare nursing elites to improve the quality of global healthcare. Nurses are on the frontlines in terms of helping the public through increasingly frequent climate-change disasters, helping care for the rising populations of older adults and patients with chronic diseases, and dealing with the emergence of new infectious diseases. Advancing the knowledge and capabilities of global nursing elites is imperative. The main purpose of nursing education is to educate future nursing leaders. This paper describes the internationalization of nursing education in the Department of Nursing at National Cheng Kung University as well as the process of establishing the Asia-Pacific Nursing Education Alliance to highlight the international characteristics of nursing education, the related global social influence, and the pursuit of sustainable development goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Health policies in many advanced countries have been revised and reformed to address increasing public healthcare demands and increasingly limited resources. Upgrading the quality and quantity of community healthcare is the most effective solution. Implementation of the National Health Insurance system in Taiwan has introduced instability into the medical system, as insurance premiums no longer correspond to healthcare demand, Taiwanese live inadequately healthy lifestyles, and expectations of the healthcare system continue to grow. Community nursing now faces many challenges at this historic crossroads. This paper tries to analyze factors in the domestic and international environment that affect Taiwan's national community healthcare. These include changes in population structure, adjustment of governmental policies, the implementation of nursing and medical regulations, and consensus among nursing professional groups. The authors hope to anticipate the trends and prospects and advantages and opportunities in community healthcare in the coming decade in order to help our community healthcare partners prepare a good foundation and establish a model for the national healthcare system and nursing profession.

A number of regulations concerning women and children have been introduced recently in Taiwan, and those regulations have improved the safety for women and children. But there remain problems as far as evidence gathering for medical and forensic purposes is concerned, giving rise to continuing difficulties in enforcing the regulations. Sexual assault nurse examiners (SANEs) perform one of several recognized forensic nursing roles. The position of SANE was developed to improve medical care for persons who have been sexually assaulted. The SANE education program combines the roles of nursing/medicine, law enforcement, prosecution, and advocacy to provide services involving both compassion and comprehensive medical-legal evaluation by a specially trained professional who has the experience to anticipate their needs during this time of crisis. This paper introduces SANEs in forensic nursing, discusses the way forensic nursing is conducted and introduces Taiwan's SANE training program for sexual assault victims.

Labor issues related to the nursing profession have been gaining prominence in Taiwan as well as overseas. In 2016, the United Nations highlighted the importance of societies investing sufficient funds in their professional nurses to support and promote public health, gender equality, and economic growth. Good-quality care requires that nurses have good physical and mental health, while creating and maintaining a friendly nursing work environment rely on cooperation among the government, labor unions, and hospitals. Over the past decade, the Taiwan government has increasingly promoted relevant regulations and established a friendly platform to allow nursing staffs to identify problems and report labor rights violations. In addition, nurses have formed unions to defend and advocate for their professional rights. After the outbreak of COVID-19 in late 2019, the Department of Nursing and Health Care of the Ministry of Health and Welfare actively proposed policies related to creating and maintaining good nursing work environments. The Taiwan Nursing and Medical Industries Union took a supervisory role in this process, providing feedback on policies from the perspective of Taiwan's professional nurses and arguing for the reasonable and fair subsidization of epidemic prevention facilities, implementation of mask and protective equipment, nursing labor rights, and social respect for the nursing profession. Much work still needs to be done to improve the domestic working environment for nursing staffs, including improving and expanding education, normalizing and effectively utilizing nursing staff feedback and whistleblowing information, promoting information transparency, and implementing better policies. We hope that a friendlier nursing work environment will attract many more outstanding young persons to pursue a career in nursing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Caring for dying patients is an emotional burden for nurses. Purpose: This study used reflective groups to explore the process of transition that nurses go through in caring for dying patients. Methods: We adopted a phenomenological approach. Data were collected from nurses participating in 12 reflective groups. All nurses worked in oncology / hospice units in a general hospital in Taipei. We used thematic analysis to analyze data. Results: Findings identified a transition in how nurses handled and contained their emotions within three main themes: (1) containing unpredictable reality, (2) cautious "holding back" in discussion, and (3) self-cultivation in order to serve others. These findings led us to extrapolate the three issues of wounded healer, facing others, and altruism in caring. Conclusions / Implications for practice: This study represented the holding and containing of nurses in caring for dying patients and held group dialogues to facilitate reflection. Findings will be used to facilitate nurse self-awareness and improve end-of-life care quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]