"I would say my most important role ... is to assure that the nurses have the resources they need."It's been a long time since Janis Dubow, RN, MSN, has been at the bedside. But that doesn't mean she isn't intimately involved in patient care.
As vice president of patient care and chief nursing officer at Northside Hospital, Dubow seeks ways to help her nurses improve patient care and give patients a good experience at the hospital. Along the way, she makes efforts to recognize nursing excellence among her staff.
Her work with her nursing staff, her leadership as a nursing executive and her involvement with the community was recently highlighted when she was honored as a member of the 2004 Academy of Women Achievers by the YWCA of Greater Atlanta. Dubow received the honor during the organization's awards ceremony in May.
"My philosophy of nursing is to make the patient experience one that is most satisfying to the patient and the family, at whatever stage of life or illness the patient is in, to make them as comfortable as possible. That comes through a family-centered approach," she said.
At Northside for more than 17 years and chief nursing officer for the past 10, Dubow has seen the needs of the area's patient population change and has adapted services to those needs, whether it's education for patients seeking perinatal advice or those who need information about mid-life changes.
Dubow is known as a "nurse's nurse." She oversees between 1,800 and 2,000 nurses - from neonatal to geriatrics to oncology - and has worked to help her staff excel.
"I would say my most important role ... is to assure that the nurses have the resources they need - whether it is in the environment they work in, or the equipment they work with - so they can take care of the patient," she said. Dubow gets ideas for improvement from the nurses, in part due to the hospital's leadership philosophy of shared governance.
"Shared governance is shared decision-making between staff and leadership," she said. "I think that people at the bedside are in the best position to help identify what their needs are - they help shape our priorities and goals from a leadership perspective."
Dubow often works with other nurse executives and deans of nursing schools to help ensure an adequate nursing force for the future.
She is involved with the Georgia Organization of Nurse Leaders/Georgia Hospital Association, the American Organization of Nurse Executives and other national and statewide organizations.
Through the Georgia nurse leaders organization, she works with other nurse executives and nursing school deans to craft new approaches to educating future nurses.
But retention remains one of the most important tools of recruitment, she said.
[At Northside], "We spend a lot of our effort on retention activities," Dubow said. "One that we developed is a professional recognition program. Nurses like to feel valued and recognized for their contributions.
"Also, peers will nominate those [nurses] who they feel who are clinical experts in their area. These nurses were recognized in a celebration during nursing week."