Prescribing powers for nurses.
Common sense demands that district nurses and health visitors be empowered to prescribe from a limited list of dressings and products. News that the vast majority of MPs support the initiative comes as no surprise. Nurse prescribing from a limited list has in fact won favour from the medical, pharmaceutical, consumer and nursing lobbies. Senior Government figures are also known to have certain sympathies with the measure. It's true to say that virtually all see the obvious merits of facilitating community nurses to carry out a more effective role. In 1989 the Government's Advisory Report outlined a workable framework for nurse prescribing. It included the provision of adequate training for the 28,000 nurses this legislation would effect. The groundwork has been done. Why then are we still waiting for some movement from the Department of Health?