Nursing Workforce Solutions for 21st Century Health Care: How Do We Get There?

Friday, June 12, 2009—9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Union Station Columbus Club, Washington, DC
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This forum is presented by Health Affairs and the Center to Champion Nursing in America, a joint initiative of AARP, the AARP Foundation and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Join us for a discussion, moderated by Susan Dentzer of Health Affairs, examining the impact of the nursing workforce on health care delivery, access and quality. This event also marks the publication of several papers in Health Affairs focusing on the nursing workforce and health care quality.

Key to fundamental health care reform is building, empowering, and deploying a 21st century health care workforce. A right-sized, richly-skilled, and effectively integrated nursing workforce is essential to achieving high quality health care. Getting there from here, however, presents a significant strategic challenge.

Discussion will focus on:

• Specific ways health care reform can ensure we have the nursing workforce necessary to provide the primary and preventive care, chronic care management, and care coordination that form the core of a more effective and efficient health care delivery system.
• The shortage of nurses that threatens health care access, quality and cost effectiveness.
• Evidence-based solutions for ensuring sufficient numbers of highly-skilled nurses.
• Lessons from Oregon, an exemplar state addressing nursing workforce and health care delivery.
  

Speakers include:

• Congresswoman Lois Capps (invited), Chair, Congressional Nursing Caucus
  
• Caya Lewis (invited), Director of Outreach and Public Health Policy, Department of Health and Human Services Office of Health Care Reform
  
• Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, President & CEO, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
  
• John Rother, Executive Vice President, Policy & Strategy, AARP
  
• Susan Reinhard, Senior Vice President & Director, AARP Public Policy Institute; Chief Strategist, Center to Champion Nursing in America
  
• Linda Aiken, Director, Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research, University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing
  
• Peter Buerhaus, Director, Center for Interdisciplinary Health Workforce Studies, Vanderbilt University Medical Center
  
• Brenda Cleary, Director, Center to Champion Nursing in America
  
• Robin Newhouse, Assistant Dean, Doctor of Nursing Practice Program & Associate Professor, University of Maryland School of Nursing
  
• Jonathan Weiner, Professor, Health Policy & Management, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health
  
• As well as several key Congressional staffers

For more information contact: Caroline Okumu — (703) 717-6243, aarp@smithfairfield.com