NURSING INFORMATION SOURCES 2

Nursing Information Sources

Nurses are required to offer very high quality services to patients. To be able to offer
such services they need to continuously update their nursing knowledge through reading the
latest research guiding various nursing practices. To this end, there are multiple sources that a
nurse can get reliable information to incorporate into their daily practice.
One of these sources is the Centre for Disease and Prevention, better known by its
acronym (CDC). The CDC, a U.S. federal agency, is the leading public health institute in the
USA (Ellis, 2019). Its website has the most up to date information derived from high quality
research on a wide range of health problems particularly infectious diseases and occupational
safety and health (Ellis, 2019).
Apart from CDC, the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) is also a
great source of information on current nursing practices. The association is the largest of its kind
in the U.S. with tens of thousands of nurses as members (Borbasi, 2015). As a source of
information, it has two reliable journals -Journal for Nurse Practitioners and Journal of American
Association of Nurse Practitioners (Borbasi, 2015). These journals have a lot of useful
information that helps nurses remain up-to-date with research that is going on in the nursing
field.
The National Institute of Health is another important source of nursing information. The
institute supports a lot of medical research whose findings it regularly publishes. Most of the
research is geared towards finding evidence-backed practices that can be incorporated into daily
nursing operations for improvement of the health of patients (Borbasi, 2015).

NURSING INFORMATION SOURCES 3
Lastly, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) provides
valuable information on practically every health problem in the U.S. This information is well-
researched and up-to-date (Ellis, 2019). Regularly visiting its website, therefore, greatly
increases the effectiveness of nurses.
In conclusion, while the list is not exhaustive, it has agencies and departments whose
websites are replete with valuable healthcare information. Nurses are encouraged to read
information released by these agencies regularly in addition to similar agencies elsewhere. Such
reading will not only help them to have up-to-date information but also become better nurses.

NURSING INFORMATION SOURCES 4

References

Borbasi, S., & Jackson, D. (2015). Navigating the maze of research: Enhancing nursing and
midwifery practice. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Ellis, P. (2019). Evidence-based practice in nursing. Learning Matters.