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February 17–March 23, 2020 8 Working Nurse l WorkingNurse.com ON THE QUICK Nursing & Healthcare News Nurse Practitioners for Mental Health Program to add 300 NPs in California C alifornia's supply of mental health providers is about to get a major shot in the arm: The California Health Care Foundation (CHCF) and three UC schools of nursing have just launched a new program to train 300 additional psy- chiatric mental health nurse practitioners (PMHNPs) over the next five years. Tackling the Provider Shortage A year ago, the California Future Health Workforce Commission warned that the state faces a mental health provider shortage that will only get worse as aging psychiatrists and psychologists retire over the next decade. Psychiatric mental health nurse practitioners could help address that shortfall, but there aren't enough of them to meet the demand, and existing training programs add only 70 to 80 more each year. The commission's final report recommended a major investment in mental health training for NPs. Now, that recommendation has become a reality: CHCF, UC Davis, UCLA and UCSF are launching a new post-master's cer- tificate program that will almost double the state's PMHNP training capacity. Hundreds of Thousands Will Benefit The new PMHNP certificate program will be 30 units, taking nine to 12 months to complete and including 500 supervised clinical hours. Most classes will be conducted online (with three in-per- son sessions), making the program available to NPs in rural areas who haven't previously had access to this type of training. Running the program won't be cheap — estimated five-year cost is $24.6 million — but it should pay big dividends: 300 addi- tional PMHNPs by 2025. "Once these providers are fully deployed," says CHCF President and CEO Sandra R. Hernández, "they will improve access to mental health care for hundreds of thousands of Californians who desperately need it." The program will accept 45 students for the initial fall 2020 cohort. Application deadline is May 1. For more information, visit nursing.ucsf.edu. WN For direct links to the websites cited, find these articles at WorkingNurse.com PALLIATIVE CARE AND MORAL DISTRESS Study calls for greater education and support H ow much do critical care RNs know about palliative care? Not nearly enough, says a new study, which warns that nurses may be paying a psy- chological price for this lack of knowledge. Education Deficit Even in fields like critical care and oncolo- gy, many nurses still receive little or no education in palliative care, which priori- tizes a seriously ill patient's quality of life over treatment for treatment's sake. According to University of Virginia School of Nursing Professor Ken White, AGACNP-BC, Ph.D., ACHPN, FACHE, FAAN, coauthor of a recent institutional study in the October 2019 issue of Critical Care Nurse, critical care RNs "believe that all the palliative care competencies are important, but they don't rate themselves as competent in those areas." Moreover, nurses who do receive pallia- tive care training may be unable to apply that knowledge due to institutional resist- ance and what White calls "a misunder- standing on the part of other care providers of what palliative is." Moral Distress The study found that not being able to provide palliative care when it would bene- fit patients takes a toll on critical care nurses: moral distress, which White defines as the anxiety that occurs "[w]hen an individual knows the morally correct action to take, but is prevented [from] doing so because of internal or external restraints." Study coauthor Alexander Wolf, RN, DNP, APRN, CCRN, warns, "The conse- quences of moral distress may have far- reaching effects on nurse well-being, as well as turnover and staffing, which may threaten patient safety and cause needless waste." White says the answer is better inter- professional education about palliative care's benefits as well as "giving the nurse a voice on the team, so they can say, 'I think it's time to call in palliative care.'" He says institutions should also provide greater support for nurses dealing with moral distress, such as offering a "moral distress consult service" to help resolve specific issues. WN