G’Day! Visitors from Down Under Talk All Things Nursing

The partnership between the Massachusetts General Hospital and MGH Institute of Health Professions now has an international element.

As part of a trip to North America, Kate Gillan and Suzie Hooper of the Epworth HealthCare system in Australia visited the hospital and school to learn more about how the two Mass General Brigham affiliates work together educating nurses and moving them into the workforce.

“This is an example of how the global stature of Mass General Hospital and our affiliation as their school of nursing is being leveraged for best practices, not only across the United States but internationally,” said Dr. Ken White, dean of the IHP’s School of Nursing and MGH’s Associate Chief Nurse for Academic Affairs.

Dr. Debbie Burke, the hospital’s Senior Vice President for Patient Care and Chief Nurse and the IHP’s Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs, noted how the relationship with the nursing school has been strengthened in recent years.

“When Kate and Suzie contacted me about wanting to see how the hospital worked to put in place partnerships with academic programs to strengthen front line practice readiness, my first reaction was to call Ken and say, ‘You need to be a part of this’,” said Burke. “We hire so many nursing graduates from the IHP and in addition to our onboarding, orientation, and residency programs for new nurses, it was natural to include the IHP given the relationship between the MGH and our School of Nursing.”

Gillan, Executive Director, Clinical Services and Chief Nursing Officer, and Hooper, Acting Director of Clinical Services, Rehabilitation and Mental Health, and Director of Clinical and Site Services for Epworth’s Camberwell facility, work at the largest not-for-profit private hospital group in Victoria, the second-most populated state in Australia. The health system has nine locations in the southeast portion of the country.

Gillan and Hooper said they want to partner with Australian universities to create an academy where nurses can earn micro-credentials needed to be advanced practice nurses and work in units such as mental health, pediatrics, and the emergency room, for example. That approach differs from the United States, where new nurses can go directly from graduation to specialty units with a bachelor’s degree.

They also looked for tips on growing professional development and research opportunities for Australian nurses, all of whom must have a bachelor’s degree to practice whereas in the U.S., some registered nurses have two-year associate degrees. Hooper noted another difference between the two countries: Australia has around 3,000 nurse practitioners. In America, the number is more than 350,000.

“The real opportunity of visiting with an international lens is seeing how others do things,” said Gillan. “I've been amazed at the similarities but it's the differences that often help you learn. That's some of the things that we're seeing today.”