Essay on Protection and Affordable Care: The Impacts of ACA on Nursing Practice

Introduction

The enactment and passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) in 2010 heralded a new era or dawn in nursing in the US since this piece of legislation proposes various radical changes that will have significant impacts on different facets of healthcare including nursing practice. This paper examines two key nursing provisions of the Obama Care and how they will affect nursing practice in the future.

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One of the key provisions of the ACA which will have tremendous positive effects on nursing practice is Section 5204. Established under this provision are the Public Workforce Loan Repayment Programs aimed at assuring that there is an adequate supply of nurses. Hence, the impact of this provision on nursing practice is that it will increase the number of nurses available to provide care and thus eliminate workforce shortages in the healthcare system. As Halloran (2014) observes, the primary objectives of rolling out health care reforms under the ACA mainly included increasing patient access to care and enhancing the quality of care while at the same time ensuring that costs of health care do not spiral beyond control.

Hence, one of the immediate effects of Obama Care will be to increase the number of insured Americans which will, in turn, affect nursing practice by increasing the demand for new practicing nurses to offer affordable and accessible primary care. Furthermore, according to Spetz (2014), even though ACA's quality incentives will not necessarily increase the number of registrered practice nurses, it will automatically lead to a demand for more skilled nurses to offer healthcare services to the increasing patient population.

Another key provision of the ACA that will affect nursing practice is Section 5208. This provision provides that $50 million in grants shall be authorized for use in operating Nursing-Managed Health Clinics (NHMCs). These NHMCs will provide wellness services and primary vulnerable or underserved patient populations regardless of their insurance status or income. Essentially, this particular provision of the Obama Care is part of a plan to expand the role of nurses in the health care system by supporting nurse-managed health centers. New roles for nurses will obviously affect the scope of their nursing practice.

According to Luther and Hart (2014), nurses and their roles will be integral in promoting some of the changes enacted under the ACA since they will help promote healthcare leadership, evidence-based care, and patient satisfaction. Moreover, as Salmond and Echevarria (2017) aver, the healthcare transformative changes under the ACA will also affect nursing roles in different ways. According to these authors, nurses will also play a pivotal role in shaping these healthcare reforms and hence affecting their nursing practice.

Conclusion

In summary, sections 5204 and 5208 of the ACA will affect nursing practice by increasing the demand for more skilled nurses and expanding the roles of nurses respectively. The Act has created the need for more educated, well trained, and competent nurses will be able to contribute to its primary goal of providing affordable, quality, and accessible care to all Americans.

References

Halloran, L. (2014). How the Affordable Care Act will affect practice in 2014. The Journal for Nurse Practitioners, 10(2), 144-145. Retrieved from www.npjournal.org/article/S1555-4155(13)00618-1/pdf

Luther, B., & Hart, S. (2014). What does the Affordable Care Act mean for nursing? Orthopaedic Nursing, 33 (6),305-309. Retrieved from https://www.nursingcenter.com/cearticle?an=00006416-201411000-00003&Journal_ID=403341&Issue_ID=2649779

Salmond, S.W., & Echevarria, M. (2017). Healthcare transformation and changing role fornursing. Orthopedic Nursing, 36(1), 12-25. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5266427/

Spetz, J. (2014). How will health reform affect demand for RNs? Economics of Health Care and Nursing, 32(1), 42-44. Retrieved from https://www.nursingeconomics.net/necfiles/news/JF_14_42.pdf