Nov 29 2013
The European Association of Urology Nurses launched a new online course for urology nurses and affiliated professionals "Bone health and urological cancer". This course tackles a highly pressing issue of maintaining and promoting bone health in cancer patients.
"The management of bone-related health problems, which can be caused by cancer metastases or as an adverse effect of cancer treatment, is a topic that continues to raise questions in our everyday practice," said Lawrence Drudge-Coates (GB), who steered the development of the course. "We need to have better knowledge on how to identify the patients who may experience a deterioration in bone health."
The online course, which has been launched earlier this month, aims to provide such knowledge to nursing practitioners, as well as physicians and other involved medical practitioners. This course is a stand-alone education tool which will be accessible through the EAUN website. It will provide extensive information on physiology key clinical issues to consider in day to day practice and most current recommendations on the management of bone health.
"What we really need to achieve today is a solid consensus on how to approach the management of this condition in a multidisciplinary setting," said Mr. Drudge-Coates "Nursing practitioners play an increasingly important role within this cooperation of professionals, and we must have an open discussion about all the pertinent issues arising from this."
The EAUN makes continuous effort to achieve a better understanding of issues faced by nursing practitioners in different European countries, identify the patterns and elaborate on possible solutions and pathways for further development.
"We have to be more robust in dividing protocols between various professionals involved in the management of bone-related health problems," concluded Mr. Drudge-Coates. "We are confident that this course will be a big step forward in the right direction."