Critical care management in the 1990s. Making collaborative practice work.

The creation of a partnership, the hallmark of true collaborative practice, is an ongoing, dynamic process. It demands commitment, energy, and creativity. It is learned and therefore must be role modeled. One must remember that it takes time to develop collaborative relationships. One must begin slowly, walk not run, and have realistic expectations. It is a joy to work in an environment that has developed and is in the process of continually developing true collaborative practice. Hope for the future of health care lies in our ability to deliver coordinated and collaborative care. Nursing, medicine, and administration together can and must provide the solutions to our health care delivery problems before those solutions are legislated. We must set policies and priorities to appropriately allocate scarce resources. We must address personnel needs, credentialing, and compensation to ensure adequate numbers of qualified staff to meet the growing needs of our patients. We must evaluate technology and our physical environments to determine the types of services that we will offer. We must continue to broaden our collaborative efforts to extend from the patient care arena into the realms of education, research, and administration. It is up to each of us and each of our colleagues to work every day toward a more collaborative practice environment. By empowering each other, we can put into place a collaboration which "works jointly with others in intellectual endeavors" rather than one which merely "cooperates with an enemy force."