World Smokefree Day (NZ) or World No Tobacco Day (Oz) is May 31st.

Tobacco kills nearly six million people each year; many are non-smokers dying from breathing second-hand smoke. Without action the epidemic will kill more than eight million people every year by 2030. More than 80% of these preventable deaths will be among people living in low- and middle-income countries.

The WHO has adopted as the world-wide theme of this year’s campaign “Ban tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship”.  Its specific goals are to:

• spur countries to comprehensively ban tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship; and
• counteract tobacco industry efforts to undermine tobacco control, specifically industry efforts to stall or stop comprehensive bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship.

The WHO has evidence that comprehensive advertising bans lead to reductions in the numbers of people starting and continuing smoking. Banning tobacco advertising and sponsorship is one of the most cost-effective ways to reduce demand for tobacco.

“ it’s important also to understand that tobacco products are the only legally available products that can kill up to one half of their regular users if consumed as recommended by the manufacturer”.

http://www.who.int/tobacco/industry/en/

If you would like to know more about regulating the tobacco industry the WHO Study Group on Tobacco Product Regulation (TobReg), has produced a series of technical reports on Tobacco Product Regulation. The third and most recent report presents the conclusions reached and recommendations made with the following two themes:

• Devices designed for the purpose of nicotine delivery to the respiratory system in which tobacco is not necessary for their operation.
• Setting regulatory limits for carcinogens in smokeless tobacco.

The Study Group’s overall recommendations are summarized in section 4. It makes interesting reading given the increasing use of these products amongst our patients. Follow this link to access this full report.

http://www.who.int/tobacco/global_interaction/tobreg/en/
DANA encourages everyone everywhere to “Quit Now” - World Smokefree Day / World No Tobacco Day on Friday 31st May 2013.
For assistance with quitting follow these links:

http://www.quit.org.nz/

 http://www.quitnow.gov.au/

It is with pleasure that we wish our DANA members and all nurses around the world a Happy International Nurses Day 2013. International Nurses Day is celebrated around the world every May 12, the anniversary of Florence Nightingale’s birth.

The theme for 2013 is: Closing The Gap: Millennium Development Goals 8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1.

The background to this theme is the adoption of the Millennium Declaration by the UN General Assembly in 2000 resulting in the creation of the Millennium Development Goals. The eight goals range from  halving extreme poverty and eradicating hunger, promoting gender equality to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and other diseases, improving maternal health, reducing child mortality, ensuring environmental sustainability and providing universal primary education by 2015.  These goals have been agreed to by all the world’s countries and leading institutions.

The theme for International Nurses Day 2013 is intended to be a countdown to ending poverty by 2015, with an emphasis on the health related goals. Nurses are key to the achievement of these goals as they are particularly well placed to reach disadvantaged populations either directly, or indirectly though advocacy and lobbying and through involvement in the development programs introduced to improve health services.

Organisations such as DANA have an important role to play in informing, advising, encouraging and supporting nurses in their work as well as working  at strengthening the health system and creating the conditions necessary to maximise the contribution of nurses.

Find out more, and access the International Nurses Day 2013 Kit, which includes a poster and education materials, at this link.

You can read more about the Millennium Goals at this  link.

Are you interested in the latest thinking, challenges and opportunities in Motivational Interviewing and the broader field of effective communication and behaviour change?
The 3^rd International Symposium on Motivational Interviewing is being held in Melbourne on May 13^th and 14^th 2013.

The event offers a friendly, stimulating environment to examine practice, share ideas and sharpen skills. The driving curiosity behind ISMI is to ask “Is what we are doing working?” and “How can we do it better?”
ISMI is open to clinicians, researchers, trainers, supervisors, managers and clients – together these different perspectives create a richer understanding of how to make the most of the conversations we have in our workplaces.

Find out more by following this link.

To be held at 7:00pm on Tuesday April 30th 2013 at the Sydney Nursing School, Sydney University, Camperdown.

Featured on the panel for the Q&A style discussion are:

• Dr Alex Wodak, Emeritus Consultant, President of the Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation and a Director of Australia21
• Reverend the Hon. Fred Nile, member of the legislative council
• Superintendent Frank Hansen, New South Wales Police Force
• Jane Sanders, principal solicitor of the Shopfront Youth Legal Centre
• Jay Bacik, CEO Life Education NSW
• Professor John Saunders, consultant physician in internal medicine and addiction medicine.

In addition, several special guests will contribute to the debate and broaden the discussion.

Find out more by following this link.

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) is developing national guidelines to assist all healthcare professionals and organisations across the Australian primary healthcare sector to produce, manage and use high quality health records that are fit for a range of purposes, including safe clinical decision-making, good communication with other health professionals and effective continuity of patient care.
The consultation period strictly closes at 9.00 am on 3 April 2013. If you wish to find out more or make comments you can access a copy of the draft Guidelines clicking on this link  guidelinesforqualityhealthrecords-consulationdraft

DANA Scholarships are available to contribute to professional development needs of DANA members.  They provide opportunities to enhance skills and practice in order to drive change and contribute to the development of drug and alcohol nursing.

From February 1st to April 30th 2013 applications for scholarships will be accepted (a further opportunity will become available again from August 1st to October 31st 2013).  In this first round preference will be given to applicants seeking support to attend the 1st Australasian Mental Health and Addiction Nursing Conference to be held in Auckland, New Zealand in June 2013. Successful applicants will be notified prior to the conference and then reimbursed after they attend. Applicants for other types of scholarships should still apply.

Full eligibility details and the relevant application form can be found at this link  DANA Scholarship Policy and Procedure 2012 to 2015

The Nursing and Midwifery Telehealth Consortia, comprised of the Australian Practice Nurses Association, the Australian College of Midwives, the Australian College of Nurse Practitioners, the Australian Nursing Federation and CRANAplus, has been funded by the Department of Health and Ageing to provide telehealth education and support specifically for nurses and midwives. The ANF has taken carriage of the development of Telehealth Professional Practice Standards and Guidelines for Nursing and Midwifery on behalf of the Consortia. They are seeking assistance with the review of the draft telehealth guidelines.  You can find the draft guidelines at this link...Guidelines_Current_Draft_6.  Responses are required by Tuesday 12th March.

The National Lead Clinicians Group (LCG) Awards for Excellence in Innovative Implementation of Clinical Guidelines recognise and reward creative, successful and cost-effective approaches to implementation of best practice. The Awards will be presented as part of the National Clinicians Network National Forum (National NCN Forum) in June 2013.

Finalists will be sponsored to attend the National NCN Forum to showcase their implementation approach by way of a presentation, and winner(s) will each receive an award of $10,000. All finalists will receive a certificate signed by the Commonwealth Minister for Health, the Hon Tanya Plibersek MP. Winner(s) may be requested to present their entries at NCN Forums to be undertaken by the National LCG during 2013-14.

Applications for the Awards close at 5pm AEDT, 16 March 2013.

Further information, and a copy of the Application Guide, is available on the National LCG website.

Should you require further information, please contact the National Lead Clinicians Group Secretariat on (02) 6289 8760 or via email at leadcliniciansgroups@health.gov.au.

Tobacco remains a significant  cause of death and disability  in Australia. Around 3.3 million

Australians still smoke and an  estimated 15,000 people die each  year of smoking-related illness.

Although Australia has been successful in reducing smoking prevalence over many years,  smoking rates in our community are still too high: 15.1 per cent of people 14 years or over were  smoking daily in 2010.1

Through the National Healthcare Agreement in 2008, and as updated in 2012, the Council of Australian Governments  committed to the following performance benchmark:

‘By 2018, reduce the national smoking rate to 10 per cent of  the population, and halve the Indigenous smoking rate, over the  2009 baseline’.

Read more by following the link to National Tobacco Strategy 2012-2018

In 2011, DANA made a submission for the Inquiry into the Prevention, Diagnosis and management of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders.  The inquiry looked at prevention strategies, intervention needs and management issues.  During the inquiry, the committee heard about the harms of alcohol on society in general and specifically to the developing fetus, the lack of FASD awareness and FASD prevalence data, the myriad of challenges that people with DFASD and their families face, and the advances made in realising a nationally-agreed diagnostic and screening tool.

Submissions, public hearings and transcripts of evidence can be accessed at: http://www.aph.gov.au/fasd

The committee found that there is little awareness of FASD or the risks of maternal alcohol consumption, in both the wider community and among health professionals.  There was overwhelming evidence that women, men, families and communities need to be award of the great risks of drinking alcohol during pregnancy.

Read more in the next issue of “DANA Unwrapped” or download  FASD_ The Hidden Harm_pamphlet