全球進階護理人員的發展：實施現況與瓶頸

Global Development of Advanced Practice Nurses: Implementation and Barriers

經濟塑造了現今的健康照護企業，也給予進階護理人員（advanced practice nurse, APN）角色發展的絕佳機會。目前全球將近50 個國家，包括台灣，已發展APN 相關角色，且多數開始於2000 年。然而，因APN 是嶄新的角色且提供的實務範圍也較為不同。國際專科護理師／進階護理網絡（international nurse practitioner/ advanced practice nursing network）已注意到多數國家於發展APN 角色時，特別是專科護理師（nurse practitioners, NP），會面臨角色名稱、教育訓練標準、實務範圍的清楚界定與法規問題。本文目的即介紹全球APN 實施現況並說明專科護理師目前在發展上所面臨的瓶頸。

Economic development shapes present health-care enterprise and gives a great opportunity for developing the role of advanced practice nurse (APN). Currently approximately 50 Countries, including Taiwan, have had APNs and most of them just developed this role around 2000. However, APNs are new roles and their practice scopes are different. Barriers to develop the APNs role, especially for nurse practitioners (NPs), have been identified by International Nurse Practitioner/Advanced Practice Nursing Network as following: titling, educational standards clearly identified scopes of practice and regulations. The purpose of this article is to explore the development of APNs globally and the bottleneck of NPs development.