The policy and practice landscape in the rehabilitation field has changed much in the two decades since the original Rehabilitation Nursing Competency Standards for Registered Nurses were first published in 2003. In light of this, the new Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia Fact Sheet: Scope of practice and capabilities of nurses and midwives (2022) and the recent development of a new Rehabilitation Practice Guideline for Enrolled Nurses, the ARNA Board tasked the ARNA Strategic Initiatives Group (Julie Pryor, Melissa Bonser, Angela Davenport, Sandra Lever, Laynie Hall Pullin, Kay Stevens and Kylie Wicks) with work to revise the Rehabilitation Nursing Competency Standards for Registered Nurses. These revisions enhance the original work and ensures the Rehabilitation Nursing Competency Standards for Registered Nurses (Revised 2023) can be used seamlessly in conjunction with the new Rehabilitation Practice Guideline for Enrolled Nurses to inform and guide contemporary rehabilitation nursing practice.
The Competency Standards for Registered Nurses enable rehabilitation nurses to enact nursing’s evidence-based understanding of rehabilitation as a continuous 24/7 process in the provision of scheduled and opportunistic goal-directed therapy across all aspects of a patient’s rehabilitation. This makes the rehabilitation nurse an integral member of the interdisciplinary care team and positions them well to provide collaborative leadership of the interdisciplinary team as they navigate complex pathways and discharge plans.
With their more contemporary language, it is anticipated that the revised Competency Standards will continue to guide the development of rehabilitation nursing practice at both an individual and system level.
At an individual level, the Competency Standards can be used as a framework for professional development to enhance knowledge and practice in relation to nursing specific responsibilities including:
• Continuous assessment and management of patient status in relation to physical, cognitive, social and emotional, and spiritual health and wellbeing
• Early identification and interpretation of signs of patient deterioration
• Timely escalation of care
• Teaching and coaching patients to enable self-management
• Psychosocial and spiritual support to enable health and wellbeing
• Individual goal-directed therapeutic care to support patient goal achievement
• Proactively manipulating the care environment and processes to support patient rehabilitation and promote patient safety and quality of care
At a system level, the Competency Standards can continue to be used to articulate rehabilitation nursing practice and guide curriculum development. Importantly, these Competency Standards are designed to be used in conjunction with the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia (NMBA) Registered Nurse (RN) standards for practice and the new ARNA Enrolled Nurse Rehabilitation Practice Guideline (2023) to advance the practice of rehabilitation in nursing.
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