The increasing demand for the services of a continence nurse led to a novel plan to combat such demand in Leicestershire. The district nursing service seconded a nurse to be trained as an adviser and then to return to the community to set up continence clinics in each health centre. The adviser selected nurses to run these clinics and taught them the skills required to do so. She also carried her own caseload.One hundred and one patients were seen in the clinics in the first year, of whom 30 were cured. In a further one third continence was greatly improved, and the remainder benefited from advice and consultation. The adviser has worked in only six health centres but has had a greater impact on dealing with incontinence than a series of lectures and seminars for district nurses over many years had had.
IntroductionAfter the health authorities and the United Kingdom Central Committee for Nursing recognised the importance of treating and managing incontinent patients there was an enormous expansion in the number ofposts for continence nurse advisers. Although there was an established continence service in Leicestershire run by a consultant geriatrician and a continence nurse adviser, they could not meet the increasing demand. Since most of the referrals came from the community, mainly initiated by community nurses, it seemed reasonable to teach these nurses to manage incontinence correctly rather than refer so many oftheir patients to a specialist adviser. A district nursing sister was seconded initially to be trained as a continence nurse adviser and then to teach the district nurses to manage this condition in health centres throughout the district. As there have been no reports of similar schemes we describe setting up such a project and its initial results.
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