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The AACN essential I have chosen to elaborate on is Essential II. Essential II: Basic Organizational and system Leadership for Quality Care and Patient Safety. I consider this essential extremely important in my current and future nursing practice. “As a member of a healthcare team, baccalaureate graduates will understand and use quality improvement concepts, processes, and outcome measures. In addition, graduates will be able to assist or initiate basic quality and safety investigations; assist in the development of improvement action plans; and assist in monitoring the results of these action plans within the clinical microsystem, which is embedded within a larger system of care” (AACN, 2014 p 13). As a clinical nurse, it is of the utmost importance for me to maintain patient safety. When patient safety is not achieved, then it is imperative to improve and investigate ways in which patient safety can be enhanced.

Essential II is currently being used in my professional nursing career during our UBT (Union based team) meetings. During these meetings, we discuss ways in which we can improve different things in our unit; one of them being patient safety. By having a better understanding on quality care and patient safety, I believe I will be better qualified to improve safety to the patients in my unit.

I believe all the nine nursing essentials will have an impact on my nursing career because they are all crucial to our nursing practice. Nursing as we know it, would stop evolving without these nine essentials. “The demands of twenty-first-century health care services will continue to test the nursing profession’s ability to maintain high caliber care that meets contemporary societal needs. Historically, the nursing profession has consistently demonstrated its ability to adapt to changing and varied health care needs. There is little doubt that nursing will continue to maintain its status as an extremely important profession, serving the health needs of the nation” (University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing).