Nova Scotia Health Library Services logo

Library News

Showing 10 of 30 Results

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy January Round-up: Dynamic Health Updates + Renal Dialysis + Urinary Catheters + Radial Compression Devices + Alzheimer's Awareness Month + Let’s Talk Day
01/07/2025
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Teaching & Learning, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health, Physiotherapy

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy round-up posts keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health, highlight any new priority projects and events, as well as updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills. We’ll also highlight new publications we’re supporting and maintaining including policies, clinical practice support guides, clinical resources on the intranet and clinical learning modules.

Dynamic Health Updates

We receive feedback submissions on an ongoing basis through the Suggest an Edit form and through partnerships with departments and teams. This month, the following customizations have been added:

New Workplace Note

Revised Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

Custom Skills

Clinical Practice Supports

Renal Dialysis, Urinary Catheters and Radial Compression Devices

Clinical Practice Supports for Health Care Providers are subject guides created with clinical leaders, educators and frontline staff for use at the point-of-care and when acquiring or refreshing clinical competencies. Clinical Practice Support subject guides are maintained by Interprofessional Practice and Learning (IPPL) - Clinical Practice and Policy. The goal is to adopt evidence-based clinical resources that can be implemented without re-inventing the wheel. Where novel contexts or gaps exist, we support the creation and maintenance of resources that support nursing and allied health professionals with working to scope and with providing evidence-based, quality patient care.

We are pleased to launch three new Clinical Practice Supports for Nursing:

  • Renal Dialysis
    • Custom Dynamic Health skills from the Renal Care Program, including policies, appendices (with images) and patient education pamphlets.
  • Urinary Catheters
    • Adopted Dynamic Health skills with workplace notes, care directives, patient education pamphlets, NSWOC guidelines and decision aids, and key practice points.
    • Note: The Urinary Catheters page on the Clinical Practice Supports for Nursing guide replaces several outdated policy documents. Read more in this recent memo.
  • Radial Compression Devices
    • Custom Dynamic Health skill for reapplying a Teruma TR band, and background guidance to support competency in this skill. Includes key info like relevant order sets, anatomy, patient education and alternative device (Zoom Hemostop) support.

Health Promotion in January and Dynamic Health Topics

January 2025 marks the promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggestions for Skills form with your notes and we will get in touch!

Alzheimer's Awareness Month

Let's Talk Day

 

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Leah MacDonald, RN, BSc, BScN
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network Hub, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Valorie Shaddick, BNRN, CCNP, CVAA (c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, Library Services

Ethics Nova Scotia Health: Ethics support for policy developers
12/16/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Ethics, Nurse Practitioners

Ethics Nova Scotia Health can provide input at any stage of the policy development process. In this blog post, we outline how we help policy developers and working groups with ethics input at different stages of the process.

Ethics support during the initial policy development stage

It may be useful to reach out for ethics support early in the policy development process if you are developing or revising a ‘high stakes’ policy, e.g.:

  • A policy that affects equity-seeking populations
  • A policy that involves curtailing the liberty of patients, or other kinds of value-based tensions

At this stage, our team can assist with assessing policy options from an ethics lens. We can work with you to identify how well these options align with our organizational principles and values, as well as other relevant principles and values. Depending on the complexity of the policy (or the complexity of the related ethics issues), it may also help to include a member of Organizational Ethics and Policy Support on the policy development group.

Ethics support during the policy writing stage

It is not always easy to identify and weigh the principles and values that should inform a policy. We can assist policy working groups to identify and formulate relevant principles and values specific to the policy they are developing.

We can also support your group to facilitate a discussion if there is disagreement about how different values should be weighted within the policy, especially if some of these values are in tension with each other.

To help you determine the type of ethics support that may be most beneficial for your working group, or when to reach out to Ethics Nova Scotia Health for ethics support with a policy, visit:

How can Ethics Nova Scotia Health help you develop policies?

You can learn more about the role of ethics in health policy development in Nova Scotia Health Ethics Network’s (NSHEN) Fireside chat with Policy Manager, Michelle Helliwell. The video comes with a discussion and resource page, for use in facilitating discussions or for further reflection.

Another useful resource is NSHEN’s Ethics and Health Policy: The Nuts and Bolts. While this guide is written for a general audience and is not specific to Nova Scotia Health’s policy development process, it provides useful guidance around ensuring that the policy process is ethics-informed, including:

  • Addressing power dynamics
  • Managing conflicts
  • Identifying and considering relevant principles and values

Ethics review of a policy

If you are sending out a draft policy for feedback, you may want to include Ethics Nova Scotia Health in the collaborating-partners feedback survey.

Organizational Ethics and Policy Support, a core function group with Ethics Nova Scotia Health, meets on the second Friday of each month. At these meetings, we review draft policies from an ethics lens. We summarize both general and section-specific feedback and highlight any potential ethical implications or concerns that the group may have. We are always happy to answer questions and are available to assist with implementing our feedback.

Please submit your policy review request according to our submission deadlines. Requestors can expect to receive feedback about one week after the meeting date.

For ethics input on a policy:

Complete our Ethics Input on Policy request form

Email: ethicssupport@nshealth.ca

For more information about ethics support:

Visit: Ethics Nova Scotia Health

Phone (toll-free): 1-833-392-1413

Lisbeth Witthoefft Nielsen

Ethics Program Manager, Ethics Nova Scotia Health

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy December Round-up: Dynamic Health Updates + Archived Policy Documents + Focus DH Search Results + World AIDS Day + International Day of Persons with Disabilities + Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women
12/04/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Teaching & Learning, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health, Physiotherapy

Dynamic Health round-up posts keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health. They highlight any new priority projects and events as well as updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills.

Dynamic Health Updates

We receive feedback submissions on an ongoing basis through the Suggest an Edit form and through partnerships with departments and teams. This month, the following customizations have been added:

New Workplace Note

Revised Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

Custom Workplace Skills

Archived Policy Documents

As of November 13, 2024, all outdated, former DHA policy and related documents listed in this memo have been archived. This change is the result of a consultative process involving IPPL leadership, the Policy Office, the IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy Program, and Clinical Nurse Educators with expertise in specific clinical areas where required.

As part of our ongoing commitment to supporting practice and learning, we are actively working to empower staff through a procedure-first approach to creating and managing clinical practice supports, pointing to current procedural guidance in Dynamic Health (when appropriate) or supporting clinical teams with custom solutions where gaps exist, or organizational alignment is required. If you have any questions about the recently archived documents and wish to provide a review with additional notes on any of the Dynamic Health skills that replace outdated guidance, please email the IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy team.

Focused Search Results in Dynamic Health

There’s a lot of evidence-based guidance summarized across Dynamic Health’s Topic Sections – from Diseases & Condition Summaries to Skills. The only content that can be annotated with a Workplace Note is labelled as a Skill. Understanding how to Filter Results can help you make the most of your time searching and ensure you have all the relevant information you need if you plan to adopt one or multiple skills from Dynamic Health.

Let’s say you are looking for skills about taking blood pressure in adults:

  1. From the main page of Dynamic Health, enter “blood pressure” in the search box.
    Do not choose one of the autosuggestions that populate as you type.
    Click the spy glass to run the search.
  2. To the left of the results page, note the Filter Results column. Under CONTENT TYPE check off Skills. Note the filter is applied immediately, resulting in fewer results.
  3. Under PATIENT POPULATION, check off Adult. Note that results are reduced further and that the Skills and Adult filters are highlighted at the top.
  4. Click the X on each filter at the top of the results page to remove them.

Health Promotion in December and Dynamic Health Topics

December 2024 marks the promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggest an Edit form with your notes and we will get in touch!

World AIDS Day

International Day of Persons with Disabilities

National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women

 

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Leah MacDonald, RN, BSc, BScN
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network Hub, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Valorie Shaddick, BNRN, CCNP, CVAA (c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, Library Services

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy November Round-up: Dynamic Health Updates + New Look to Workplace Notes + Fall Prevention Month + National Pain Awareness Week + Diabetes Awareness Month
11/05/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Teaching & Learning, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health, Physiotherapy

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy round-up posts keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health, highlight any new priority projects and events, and updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills. We’ll also highlight new publications we’re supporting and maintaining including policies, clinical practice support guides, clinical resources on the intranet and clinical learning modules.

Dynamic Health Updates

We receive feedback submissions on an ongoing basis through the Suggest an Edit form and through partnerships with departments and teams. This month, the following customizations have been added:

New Workplace Note

Revised Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

New Look: Workplace Notes

We are now able to use a bit more style when laying out our workplace notes in Dynamic Health, thanks to a recent system update! We can now add headers, bullets and bolding more easily. We can also embed links within the text of workplace notes.

If a suite of skills is connected to a Clinical Practice Support guide, the note may look like this:

If a skill is standalone and unconnected to a Clinical Practice Support guide, the note may look like this:

There will continue to be diversity of layout of notes, but this style will be applied to all new and updated content moving forward. If you have any feedback, questions, etc., reach out to DynamicHealth@nshealth.ca.

Health Promotion in November and Dynamic Health Topics

November 2024 marks the promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggestions for Skills form with your notes and we will get in touch!

Fall Prevention Month

National Pain Awareness Week

Diabetes Awareness Month

 

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Leah MacDonald, RN, BSc, BScN
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network Hub, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Valorie Shaddick, BNRN, CCNP, CVAA (c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, Library Services

Ethics Nova Scotia Health: New structure for ethics support - Part 1
10/28/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Ethics, Nurse Practitioners

In September 2024, Ethics Nova Scotia Health launched its new model for delivery of ethics support. This was done to:

  • better align ethics support with the organization’s movement towards provincial approaches to program delivery and administration.
  • promote greater availability of ethics support across the province.

This post looks at the structure for ethics support and the changes we have made, and the types of ethics support available to health care providers, staff members, volunteers, and patients and families.

Changes to Ethics Nova Scotia Health’s structure

The main change to our structure is the formation of three Core Function Groups:

  • Clinical Ethics Support
  • Organizational Ethics and Policy Support
  • Ethics Education

These groups replace the previous Local Ethics Teams, Zone Ethics Committees, and the Ethics Leads group.

As of October 2024, Ethics Nova Scotia Health's updated structure and community includes about 55 members from all four zones. Each Core Function Group consists of health care providers and staff members from a wide range of programs and services, and community members. These Core Function Groups provide ethics support within Nova Scotia Health, with support from the Ethics Collaborations Team in the Department of Bioethics at Dalhousie University.

Types of ethics support available

While the delivery of ethics support has changed, the types of ethics support available remain the same and include:

  • Clinical Ethics Support offers ethics support pertaining to a specific patient’s care or to a particular clinical situation involving questions of professional ethics.
  • Ethics Education is available for education days or if there is an ethics topic that your team would like to explore. We can tailor the education session(s) to your needs. Some recent topics we have worked on include “ethics issues in health care documentation” and “moral distress.” We also develop ethics education resources, such as a guide for patients and families about Making Health Care Decisions for Someone Else: Acting as a Substitute Decision-Maker (SDM), and our Ethics Tool: Help with Ethical Issues.
  • Organizational Ethics and Policy Support addresses broader, systems-level issues that typically affect larger groups of patients and other stakeholders. Organizational ethics may involve overall direction for programs, zones, and Nova Scotia Health as a whole, where an ethics perspective can contribute to analysis and strategic choices. This can also include support with policy development and/or ethics review of policies. This Core Function Group is available to review draft policies through an ethics lens, as well as offer support in applying our feedback.
    For upcoming deadlines and details on how to submit policies for an ethics review, see our Ethics Review of Nova Scotia Health Policies – Submission Deadlines.

In part 2 of this post, we will take a closer look at ethics support available for policy developers and the process for requesting and obtaining stakeholder feedback on draft policies from Ethics Nova Scotia Health.

If you need ethics support, you can:

Lisbeth Witthoefft Nielsen

Ethics Program Manager, Ethics Nova Scotia Health

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy October Round-up: Dynamic Health Updates + Auto-generated Checklists + CPS Guides: Transfusion Medicine – Blood Product Administration + Breast Cancer Awareness Month + Occupational Therapy Month + World Psoriasis Day
10/01/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Teaching & Learning, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health, Physiotherapy

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy round-up posts keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health, highlight any new priority projects and events, and updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills. We’ll also highlight new publications we’re supporting and maintaining including policies, clinical practice support guides, clinical resources on the intranet and clinical learning modules.

Updates: Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills, Transfusion Medicine – Blood Product Administration Clinical Practice Support (CPS) Guides

We receive feedback submissions on an ongoing basis through the Suggestions for Skills form and through partnerships with departments and teams. This month, the customizations below have been published.

New Workplace Note

Revised Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

Custom Workplace Skill

Auto-generate Checklists with Dynamic Health

Did you know that skills within Dynamic Health have an associated Checklist function that you can use in practice and for instructing new staff and learners? If you’re updating procedures and need associated competency checklists for documentation, save yourself some time and adopt this function. The Checklist function is available for all skills in Dynamic Health, including any Custom Workplace Skills we create.

Let's say you are interested in precepting a fellow health care provider using the Dynamic Health Custom Workplace Skill PACU: Assisting with Endotracheal Extubation in Adults:

  1. Navigate to the skill through Dynamic Health by searching “PACU Extubation” (1), navigating to Skills > Your Workplace, or through the direct Skill link (above).
  2. From the Skill menu, select Checklist (2).
  3. Select the printer icon to the upper right of the Checklist (3).
  4. Select the sections to include in the Checklist (Pre-procedure Steps, Procedure Steps, Post-procedure Steps), or Select All (4).
  5. Select Print (5). Note that the printable version of this checklist contains a form to allow you to record evaluator and examinee names and signatures, date and pass/fail status as appropriate.
  6. Choose to print a physical copy or to export a PDF to your computer, depending on your settings and needs.

CPS Guides: Transfusion Medicine – Blood Product Administration

The Blood Product Administration Policy and Procedure NSHA: CL-BP-030; IWK-625 has been revised, effective as of October 1, 2024. We supported our Transfusion Practice Coordinator and Pathology & Laboratory Medicine colleagues with building a resource guide that helps make accessing blood product administration resources easier and is embedded within the updated policy. All blood product guidelines, product monographs, the Competencies for Safe Transfusion Tool, Adverse Events Algorithm have also been updated to align with the revised policy and procedure.

This project is a great example of collaborating across the organization to build and update a knowledge support resource that is easily accessible to all health care providers that work for or interact with Nova Scotia Health. It’s also a great example of clinical practice guidance and competency being created outside of the content we adopt from Dynamic Health. We’re ready to help you customize solutions where practice or organizational gaps exist versus the content we can access through our Dynamic Health subscription.

Health Promotion in October and Dynamic Health Topics

October 2024 marks the promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggestions for Skills form with your notes and we will get in touch!

Breast Cancer Awareness Month
Occupational Therapy Month
World Psoriasis Day

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Leah MacDonald, RN, BSc, BScN
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network Hub, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Valorie Shaddick, BNRN, CCNP, CVAA (c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, Library Services

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy September Round-up: Dynamic Health Updates Summary + CE Credits Reminder + Policy Clean-up and Clinical Resources (Intranet) + Fibromyalgia Awareness Week + Arthritis Awareness Month + World Sepsis Day
09/03/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Teaching & Learning, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health, Physiotherapy

The team operationalizing usage of Dynamic Health has broadened their scope to include supporting use of evidence at the point of care, across nursing and allied health, and within policies and other guidance materials Interprofessional Practice and Learning (IPPL) leads or collaborates on. This means we’re back with Dynamic Health Round-ups after a summer hiatus with a new name – IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy.

Round-up posts will keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health, highlight any new priority projects and events, and updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills. We’ll also highlight new publications we’re supporting and maintaining including policies, clinical practice support pages, clinical resources on the intranet and clinical learning modules.

Read on to get caught up on what we’ve been up to over the summer months, so you are ready for Fall!

Dynamic Health Updates: Workplace Notes, Custom Skills

New Workplace Note

Revised Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

Custom Skills

Policy Clean-Up and Clinical Resources (Intranet)

The IPPL Policy and Practice Team continues to work through our policy document cleanup, focusing on former DHA guidance documents in OP3. To date we have issued updates on Chest Tubes and Nasogastric Tubes. We’re finishing up our Pain Assessment and Documentation items and will soon be focused on Urinary Catheters. Watch for updates on the Intranet’s Clinical Resources page, under Memos and Updates.

Nursing CE Credits Due in October

Nursing Leadership and Practice Points are due to health services managers in October! Make sure you’ve created a Dynamic Health personal account and have exported your points. If you haven’t made a personal account yet, it’s easy to do through the in-app pop-up running in Dynamic Health until the end of October. Learn more about setting up a personal account, earning and exporting CE credits, and consult our table on how Dynamic Health credits and activity convert to Leadership and Practice Points in the Dynamic Health support guide.

Health Promotion in September and Dynamic Health Topics

September 2024 marks promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggestions for Skills form with your notes and we’ll get in touch!

Fibromyalgia Awareness Week

Arthritis Awareness Month

World Sepsis Day

IPPL Clinical Practice and Policy

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Leah MacDonald, RN, BSc, BScN
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, ERIN Network Hub, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Valorie Shaddick, BNRN, CCNP, CVAA (c)
Clinical Nurse Educator
Interprofessional Practice and Learning

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice and Learning, Library Services

Dynamic Health June Round-up: New Workplace Notes + Custom Skills + Custom Skill Case Studies + Cataract Awareness Month + Migraine Awareness Month + PTSD Awareness Day
06/03/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Teaching & Learning, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health

Dynamic Health round-up posts keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health. They highlight any new priority projects and events, as well as updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills.

Updates: Reviewed Skills, Workplace Notes and Custom Skills

We receive feedback submissions about Dynamic Health skills on an ongoing basis through the Suggest an Edit form and through partnerships with departments and teams.

Reviewed: New Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

Custom Skills

Archived Custom Skills

Using the PronatorPlus (Melior Motus) for Positioning, Repositioning and/or Lateral Transfer

  • The vendor for the PronatorPlus has made the organization aware that they will no longer be providing service, repair, technical support, replacement parts, nor supply of the PronatorPlus. The product is removed from service/use at Nova Scotia Health.

Custom Skill Case Studies: C&S Swab and Clinical Frailty Scale

What are custom skills?

In addition to adding Workplace Notes at the top of skills, Dynamic Health also has the functionality to create standalone custom skills. You’ll find all our Custom Skills in Dynamic Health by selecting Skills (1) > Your Workplace (2) from the main menu.

When should a custom skill be created?

When a need for procedure/skill support relevant to nursing and/or allied health is identified, a custom skill may be offered if it is determined that:

  • Dynamic Health does not have an existing skill that matches the need (content gap), or,
  • Dynamic Health’s content does not align enough with NS Health practice to support use of existing skill content with a Workplace Note.

Case Studies by Purpose

Two custom skills are highlighted below, including context around why a Custom Skill was selected to meet the local need. If you feel you have a unique clinical practice need that would benefit from a Custom Skill, reach out!

Dynamic Health contains more content than just skills. There is some general guidance regarding lab tests, medication, etc. that may differ from unique, local practices and terminology. The Skin and Wound Care Program identified a need to point users to their local guidance about performing a C&S swab. We created this custom skill to direct users to their recommendations when searching. For example, if you search “C&S” or “Wound Swab” across all Dynamic Health, their custom skill is the top result.

Think Frailty was recently published as a subject guide to support education about, and use of, the CFS for patients 65 and older across Nova Scotia Health. To ensure the CFS and related supports were available through the Dynamic Health Skills menu and when users search, we created a custom skill to connect to the scale through the subject guide. Like the C&S example above, you can search a term like “Frailty”, and Custom Skill is the first result.

Health Promotion in June and Dynamic Health Topics

June 2024 marks promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggestions for Skills form with your notes and we will get in touch!

Migraine Awareness Month

Cataract Awareness Month

PTSD Awareness Day

Dynamic Health Project Team

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator, (CNE)
Interprofessional Practice & Learning

Leah MacDonald
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice & Learning, COVID-19 Response

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice & Learning, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice & Learning, Library Services

Dynamic Health May Round-up: New Workplace Notes + National Nursing Week and Dynamic Health in Practice + Celiac Disease Awareness Month + Cystic Fibrosis Awareness Month + Melanoma and Skin Cancer Awareness Month
05/03/2024
Library Staff
Nursing, Physicians, Clinical Practice & Policy , Point-of-Care Tools, Paramedicine, Nurse Practitioners, Occupational Therapy, Dynamic Health, Physiotherapy

Dynamic Health round-up posts keep you informed about implementation and use of Dynamic Health at Nova Scotia Health. They highlight any new priority projects and events, as well as updates to our Workplace Notes and Custom Workplace Skills.

Updates: Reviewed Skills and Workplace Notes

We receive feedback submissions about Dynamic Health skills on an ongoing basis through the Suggest an Edit form and through partnerships with departments and teams.

Reviewed: New Workplace Note

Reviewed: No Workplace Note

National Nursing Week and Dynamic Health in Practice

National Nursing Week is May 6-12, 2024, and this year's theme is Changing Lives. Shaping Tomorrow.

Dynamic Health™ in Practice: RSV from EBSCO on Vimeo.
Select the full screen symbol to watch.

Watch in this video as Dynamic Health supports the decision making and skill development needs of a nurse and her nurse resident during their shift as they deliver exceptional care to a young patient suffering from Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) and their mother.

In actual practice, Dynamic Health flexes from Changing Lives and providing nurses with current guidance for urgent care, to Shaping Tomorrow and supporting learners with acquiring or updating practice skills through clear procedures and checklists.

Dynamic Health is available to all Nova Scotia Health staff from the Intranet’s Clinical Applications page or Library Services website. Save the friendly URL (https://library.nshealth.ca/dynamic-health) to your desktop or mobile device home screens for easy access. Once you make a personal account, you can also install the app on your mobile device for consistent access without internet connectivity.

Could your care team benefit from getting support from our team with integrating Dynamic Health into your day-to-day work, competency requirements or policy/procedure documents? Reach out to DynamicHealth@nshealth.ca. We’re ready to connect and put this tool to work for you.

Health Promotion in May and Dynamic Health Topics

May 2024 marks promotion of:

In recognition of these health promotion events, we encourage you to engage with the curated list of Dynamic Health content below.

If you spot any Skills below that you feel need a Workplace Note, consider being a reviewer! Fill out our Suggestions for Skills form with your notes and we will get in touch!

Celiac Disease Awareness Month

Cystic Fibrosis Awareness Month

Melanoma and Skin Cancer Awareness Month

Dynamic Health Project Team

Gloria Connolly, RN, BScN, NCA, WOCC(c), GNC(c)
Clinical Nurse Educator, (CNE)
Interprofessional Practice & Learning

Leah MacDonald
Professional Practice Leader
Interprofessional Practice & Learning, COVID-19 Response

Katie McLean
Librarian Educator
Interprofessional Practice & Learning, Library Services

Margaret Poitras
Policy Lead
Policy Office

Ann Slaunwhite
Library Technician
Interprofessional Practice & Learning, Library Services

STAT!Ref Titles (TDS Health): AHFS Drug Information, AORN Guidelines and More!
04/30/2024
profile-icon Vinson Li
Nursing, Evidence Summaries, Searching, Mobile Apps

TDS Health hosts a variety of resources relevant to various health care disciplines, including STAT!Ref Titles. TDS Health provides:

  • Full text access
  • A search function that can search within the full text
  • A built-in medical dictionary to help you while you read

Accessing TDS Health

From Library Services' homepage, select Search Sources in the top navigation bar. From the dropdown menu, select Databases. Select T, then TDS Health (formerly STAT!Ref).

Accessing STAT!Ref Titles

You can find a list of all the titles offered via STAT!Ref by selecting the STAT!Ref panel on the TDS Health homepage.

Searching tips

TDS Health’s search bar allows you to search within the full text of all available titles. To help you search better:

  • Use keywords rather than entering a full sentence question.
  • If you would like two or more words to be found adjacent to each other, use quotation marks (e.g. "myocardial infarction").
  • Hyphenating terms will make the search find the words in that exact order (e.g. torsades-de-pointes).

Filtering search results

On the search results page, under FILTER BY on the left, you can filter your results.

  • Custom Title Set lets you specify which titles you want to limit your search to. In the popup window, check off the titles you want to search in, then click on the floppy disk icon  in the top right.
  • DATE RANGE lets you limit the publication date range.
  • RELATED TO lets you specify the aspect of your topic you want to focus on. For example, if you searched ‘Tuberculosis’ and checked off ‘Diagnosis’, it will give you information specifically about diagnosing tuberculosis.
  • ADVANCED SEARCH provides three helpful tools:
  1. Suffixes searches for variations of your keywords (e.g. diabetes will also give you diabetic, diabetics, etc.).
  2. Related Terms looks for synonyms for your keywords (e.g. heart attack will also give myocardial infarction).
  3. Headings Only searches only within the Table of Contents.

Viewing an eBook

When viewing an ebook on TDS Health, the Table of Contents is always on the left-hand side for easy navigation between sections. In-text citations appear as superscript numbers; you can click on each number to find the full citation in the reference section.

At the top of the full text, the Tables and Figures tabs provide summaries of all the tables and figures used within the current section.

To search within the current book, click on the dropdown menu to the left of the search bar at the top of the page and select Current Title, then run your search.

TDS Health will highlight all the matching keywords within the text. To navigate between the highlighted keywords, use the Match arrows  at the top of the full text.

The Result arrows  let you navigate between all the results from the search results page.

Using Stedman’s Medical Dictionary

Stedman’s Medical Dictionary provides definitions for medical terms, abbreviations, acronyms, measurements, and more. It is offered through TDS Health and is also embedded into all the other titles on TDS Health.

To define a word within the text, simply highlight the word. A pop-up will appear with a dictionary definition as well as an audio pronunciation.

Getting the TDS Health Mobile App

If you would like to view the titles offered through TDS Health on your mobile phone, you can follow this link to the Mobile Apps and Resources subject guide for more information.

If you have questions about using STAT!Ref through TDS Health, reach out to us at AskLibrary@nshealth.ca or book a one-on-one consultation with a Library Services team member for help using this and other library resources.

Vinson Li

Librarian Educator
Yarmouth Regional Hospital, Western Zone

Field is required.