Unexpected events can occur even with a perfect pregnancy. Our neonatal intensive care team is well equipped to handle such events with highly proficient, experienced, competent, and committed team members who strive to provide family centered excellent care to the critically ill, premature and medically fragile infants 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. 85% of our neonatal intensive care unit nurses hold Bachelors degrees or higher in nursing and have specialty certification. Another 15% are working on obtaining these high accolades within a year or two. Our employee turnover rate is less than 2%. Our team includes physicians, respiratory therapists, social workers, physical therapist/ occupational therapists, dieticians, chaplaincy services, pharmacists and other unit support staff who share the same vision, mission, values, and philosophies of Harris Health System. Our team embraces and promotes evidence based practices that have become the hallmark of our neonatal intensive care unit. A few of the projects that were implemented are skin to skin care for all infants including stable intubated infants and a donor breast milk program for infants who are extremely premature and do not have mothers breast milk. Exclusive use of breast milk for extremely premature infants has significant impact on the incidence of necrotizing enterocolitis. Primary care is a successful process that was started in 2008 where dedicated as well as experienced nurses volunteer to take care of extremely premature/critically ill infants from admission to discharge consistently. The units have vibrant and enthusiastic Community of Practice (CoP) teams who are heavily involved in the neonatal nursing practice. Additionally there are unit based councils to address special events and projects. Every single RN is part of a particular council. For example, the unit based patient satisfaction council coordinates all the activities related to parent teaching sessions, discharge follow up calls, and discussion and documentation/ review of parental concerns. The unit education council is responsible for coordination of all clinical educational activities on the unit. There are also nursing clinical managers and core charge nurses for each shift to provide leadership guidance. Collaboration between the nurses, physicians and other team members is remarkable and highly commendable.
The Nursing Clinical Educator II (NCE II) applies educational theory to assessing, planning, developing, implementing and evaluating the educational activities for the assigned department/units. The NCE II participates in district nursing education to plan, develop, provide, and evaluate district level nursing education programs including nursing orientation, competency validation, internships, and staff development. The NCE II works closely with the nurse managers and director of the service/units to assists in creating and maintaining an environment that cultivates excellent patient care at the department level. The NCE II supports professional nursing practice and supports nurses in the provision of safe, effective, compassionate, and efficient nursing care in collaboration with all health care disciplines. The NCE II assumes a leadership role in continuous quality improvement for the service/units assigned. The NCE II participates in the development, implementation, evaluation, and revision of departmental/unit plans, goals, objectives, policies, and procedures. The NCE II furthers and ensures compliance with standards established by professional nursing organizations, national, state, and local regulatory agencies, and institutional policies and procedures. The NCE II upholds high standards of integrity and ethical behavior, mentors others, role models professionalism and participation in activities such as nursing organizations, nursing research, and the community.Graduation from an accredited school of nursing with a bachelors degree in nursing required. Masters degree in nursing or related field is also required.
Certification in clinical specialty is to be completed within two 2) years, if not held at the time of appointment.
Current License or valid permit to practice professional nursing in Texas.
Five (5) years of work experience in related clinical area of practice.
Two (2) years related education/leadership experience is required.
