The most prestigious and highest credential for nursing excellence and quality patient care is the American Nurses’ Credentialing Center’s Magnet designation. We are off to a great start to craft narratives and collect evidence for the Magnet Recognition ^® application! The goal is to submit all application requirements on August 1, 2019. A Magnet Steering Team has been hard at work identifying the best examples of how nursing has developed and implemented a culture of excellence at Frederick Health. It has been a heartwarming and rewarding process to share and collect information about all of the impressive initiatives and problem solving completed by our nursing staff, from a wide variety of areas around Frederick Health. To kick off our journey, we hosted two kick off events for all staff in September 2018.

Overview of the Application Components

During 2018-2019, we have nurses from nearly every unit and level working in small groups to write a portion for the Magnet application. There are 88 portions of the application and the majority requires a narrative and demonstrable improvement in outcomes; these are portions known as Sources of Evidence (SOE). The SOEs address four main components: (1) Transformational Leadership, (2) Structural Empowerment, (3) Exemplary Professional Practice, and (4) New Knowledge, Innovations and Improvements.

The narratives, evidence, and outcomes that we submit in the Magnet application document will be examples of our accomplishments, primarily from the past 48 months of submission. This is a time for nursing’s hard work and accomplishments to shine! These narratives will address the multitude of ways in which Frederick Health nurses collaborate with levels of nursing leadership, partner with multiple disciplines, implement evidence based changes, ensure coordination of care, lead quality improvement activities, address unit level staff needs, volunteer in the community, develop patient education, and many more.

The Application and Appraisal Process

After the Magnet application is officially submitted, we can expect a period of application review by the Magnet appraisers. This application review may take a few months. If approved, we will receive advance notice of a planned site visit. We anticipate this site visit would occur Spring 2020. The Commission on Magnet Recognition will review the final report submitted by the appraisal team and notify Frederick Health of their decision. The Commission designates Magnet Recognition for a period of four years and then we would re-apply for designation to continue. As you can see, this is quite an extensive journey, but one in which we strongly believe we will achieve together!