President's Message
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours! Time is really flying by as we approach the holiday season - it seems like just yesterday that many of us were together in "the happiest place on earth." Our conference at Disneyland® in Anaheim, California was a rousing success and it was with true delight that I had the opportunity to meet so many of you. Nothing can compare to the electrifying and inspiring enthusiasm that is generated when over a thousand psychiatric mental health nurses gather in one place to learn from each other and celebrate our profession! (Cont'd)

Member Profile: Q&A with Peggy Halter, PhD, APRN
Dr. Peggy Halter is Associate Dean at Ashland University's Schar College of Nursing in Ohio. She also serves as Co-Chair of APNA's Institute for Mental Health Advocacy and is a past president of the Ohio Chapter. You may recognize her name from your PMHN textbooks - she is the editor of Varcarolis and Halter's Foundations of Psychiatric Mental Health Nursing (2010), and co-edited Essentials of Psychiatric Mental Health Nursing (2009).
How did you get started in nursing?
A reassuring and life-altering back-rub by a sympathetic nurse after a C-section with my second daughter inspired me to become a registered nurse. Two months later I was enrolled in nursing school. Six years later I was employed in (thanks to a 1987 nursing shortage) the stress management unit at Akron General Medical Center. In 1990 I added a freshly minted MSN from Kent State along with a position teaching psychiatric mental health in a baccalaureate program. (Cont'd)

Annual Conference
What the APNA Janssen Scholars Had to Say!
After the conference, we surveyed our 30 APNA Janssen Scholars to see what they had to say about the conference. Here are some of their responses:
"I am deeply appreciative of the opportunity to attend this conference. Without the support of the Janssen student scholarship program, attending the APNA conference is an experience I would not likely have had until later in my career. My excitement for PMH nursing was renewed and I gained a wealth of information...that has improved my own practice and renewed my energy for improving and propelling the profession."
"I simply have an overwhelming amount of gratitude for this experience. It has ushered me into a new sense of pride and commitment to this profession and invites me to grow both professionally and personally to offer quality of care to those in need in a way which honors both my background and the needs of my clients." Read More

Annual Conference Survey
We want to hear from you, too! If you were not able to join us for the 25th Annual Conference, let us know what kept you from attending this year. We have just a few questions that will help guide us in developing future programs and conferences. If you did participate in the Anaheim, CA conference, we ask for 10 minutes of your time to complete the APNA 25th Annual Conference Survey. Your feedback is indispensable to our Education Department in improving next year's conference.
Take the Survey

10 Reasons to Join us in Pittsburgh in 2012
Next year's Annual Conference will be held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, November 7-10. Here are 10 reasons why we're excited about Pittsburgh:

Psych Nurses Have More Fun: Highlights from the 25th Annual Conference
- by Jaclyn Engelsher, APRN, DOM
This was my second year attending the American Psychiatric Nurses Association Annual Conference, and the experience again renewed my enthusiasm for live continuing education events. There were plenty of excellent speakers, exhibition (sales) booths, and poster presentations, but that is not what makes this a must-do yearly event. It is the camaraderie within the profession and the fact psych-nurses know the importance of having a good time. Here are a few of my personal highlights. (Cont'd)

Organizational Responses - Seclusion & Restraint
Earlier this month we emailed you to ask for feedback on ANCC's position statement, Reduction of Patient Restraint and Seclusion in Health Care Settings. The Board of Directors reviewed and synthesized all of the member input we received into an organizational response, which was sent to ANCC on November 8th. Read the Organizational Response

Nurse Staffing - Administrative Council Comments
The Administrative Council recently reviewed the American Nurses Association's Draft Principles for Nurse Staffing. Their feedback on the document was submitted to the ANA on November 8th, 2011. Download a PDF of the letter and comments sent to the ANA

Tobacco Dependence Council Survey
If you have not yet completed the Tobacco Dependence Council's survey, we urge you to do so as soon as possible! Your responses will help the council discover if we are making progress in helping to decrease tobacco dependence in the populations we serve. In addition, your input will be used to update and refine their strategic plan. A report of the survey findings will be shared on the APNA website once the results are in. Take the Tobacco Dependence Council's Survey

Celebrating 25 Years of APNA Video Now Online
Check out our 25th Anniversary video, debuted at the Annual Conference, to hear your fellow members' perspectives on APNA throughout the years: our greatest strengths, influence on psychiatric mental health nursing, and extraordinary membership! Watch: Celebrating 25 Years of APNA

APNA Online Store
Need gift ideas for friends and colleagues? Peruse the offerings now available in our online store: APNA t-shirts, pins, tote bags, water bottles and more! Special APNA 25th Anniversary commemorative merchandise available for a limited time. Start Shopping

New Members: 303 new APNA members since September 2011!

"Sensory Room: Reducing Violent Behavior and a Viable Alternative to Seclusion and Restraints" was featured as a podium presentation at APNA's 25th Annual Conference. To find out how sensory modulation is used as an intervention for aggressive patient behavior on an inpatient psychiatric unit, Medscape Medical News interviewed Janice Adam, RN-BC, and Timothy Meeks, BSN, RN-BC. Click here to read the interview. (Free registration required)

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) awarded three-year grants totaling $4.5 million to support research in three centers that will focus on improving clinical preventive services and practices such as screening, counseling and use of preventive medications for patients. The project will be led by three universities and includes a separate award for coordination and evaluation of the research. Full Story

A new report, Alzheimer's from the Frontlines: Challenges a National Alzheimer's Plan Must Address, offers the insights, perspectives and views from individuals across the country who participated in the Alzheimer’s Association's public input process. Full Story

Up to $1 billion dollars will be awarded to innovative projects across the country that test creative ways to deliver high quality medical care and save money. Launched today by the Department of Health and Human Services, the Health Care Innovation Challenge will also give preference to projects that rapidly hire, train and deploy health care workers. Awards will be expected to range from approximately $1 million to $30 million over three years. Applications are open to providers, payers, local government, community-based organizations and particularly to public-private partnerships and multi-payer approaches. Full Story

APRNs who treated Medicare patients and directly billed Medicare carriers fee-for-service saw an increase in their approved charges of 13.8% over the 2009 totals, reported NursingWorld.org. As a share of total Part B approved charges, APRNs increased to 1.8% over 2009's 1.6%. The largest increase observed in approved charges was for nurse practitioners, whose approved charges increased 18.4%. The increase in approved charges for each of the four APRN roles exceeded the aggregate increase in Part B charges across all providers. Full Story

Mental health problems complicate the diagnosis and treatment of chronic and acute medical problems in older adults. Enhancing nurses' knowledge and competencies in the area of mental health is critical to improving healthcare quality for this cohort. To find out more about the resources available to better prepare nurses to manage mental health issues in older adults, Medscape Medical News interviewed Lois K. Evans, PhD, RN, FAAN. Full Story (Free registration required)

The National Council for Community Behavioral Healthcare, in partnership with MTM Services and Hazelden, has selected 10 community behavioral health organizations to participate in its new Co-Occurring Disorder Learning Community. This initiative will enable participating organizations to enhance their ability to provide effective integrated and comprehensive care to individuals with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders. Full Story (Free registration required)

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a final rule with comment period that updates payment policies and rates for physicians and nonphysician practitioners (NPPs) for services paid under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) in calendar year (CY) 2012. More than 1 million providers of vital health services to Medicare beneficiaries - including physicians, limited license practitioners such as podiatrists, and NPPs such as nurse practitioners and physical therapists - are paid under the MPFS. CMS projects that total payments under the MPFS in CY 2012 will be approximately $80 billion. Full Story

The nation's mental health crisis is continuing to deepen as a result of state budget cuts and shifts of funds to Medicaid, according to a special report released today by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). Examining budgets approved for 2012 by state legislatures around the country, the report documents a total of $1.6 billion in cuts by individual states from fiscal years (FY) 2009 to 2012. Full Story

CMS, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, are calling for changes in the CoPs for hospitals and critical access hospitals (CAHs) which will impact nursing practice and patient care within these hospitals - and potentially throughout health care. Conditions of Participation (CoPs) are designed to protect patient health and safety and ensure quality of care, through specific requirements each hospital service or department must meet to participate in Medicare and Medicaid. CoPs serve as compliance guidelines for State surveyors, and minimum standards for private accrediting programs like the Joint Commission. Full Story

Divisions of the American Psychological Association have created an online petition addressing "serious reservations" about the upcoming Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th Edition (DSM-5). Launched October 22, the petition has already garnered more than 3000 signatures from mental health professionals, students, and organizations, reported MedScape. Formatted as an "Open Letter" to the DSM-5 task force of the American Psychiatric Association, the document questions the new manual's "lowering of diagnostic thresholds for multiple disorder categories, about the introduction of disorders that may lead to inappropriate medical treatment of vulnerable populations, and about specific proposals that appear to lack empirical grounding." Full Story (Free registration required)

A recent MedScape viewpoint article examines Procedural Justice in Psychiatric Care - What Nurses Should Know. Full Story (Free registration required)

The American Psychiatric Nurses Association is Accredited as a provider of continuing nursing education by the
American Nurses Credentialing Center's Commission on Accreditation.