In September 2010, the Academy of Canadian Executive Nurses (ACEN) made the decision to focus on the development of a national nursing report card. This report card would contain structure, process and outcome nursing-sensitive indicators that could be used by all healthcare sectors to measure nursing care. A collaboration with the Canadian Nurses Association (CNA), support from Health Canada and participation by Canada Health Infoway and the Canadian Institute for Heath Information led to the February 13, 2011 Think Tank towards a National Report Card.

The Think Tank was attended by representatives from ACEN, provincial nursing officers, provincial nursing associations, the federation of nursing unions, universities, and national and international researchers who are experts in the field. Content shared at the session included the current status of research completed on nursing-sensitive outcomes. The objective of the Think Tank was to develop a shared vision and critical path for the national report card, as well as support and collaboration from the nursing community, with the intent to create a draft by early 2012.

In preparation for the Think Tank, the planning committee engaged Diane Doran, RN, PhD, scientific director, Nursing Health Services Research Unit (Toronto site); Barb Mildon, RN, PhD; and Sean Clarke, RN, PhD, from the Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing, University of Toronto, to write a synthesis entitled Toward a National Report Card in Nursing; A Knowledge Synthesis. This synthesis identified "what is currently known about outcomes/performance monitoring initiatives in nursing, including specific indicators and reporting systems and what is known about the development, implementation and utilization of nursing report cares" (Doran et al. 2011). This synthesis has been condensed for publication in CJNL. The CNA/ACEN Steering Committee is confident you will find this synthesis to be comprehensive and a helpful background to the creation of national nursing-sensitive structure, process and outcome indicators.

The work of the CNA/ACEN Steering Committee to develop national nursing-sensitive indicators is on track to complete a draft for a pilot project by early 2012. The research team that developed the synthesis is continuing to collaborate on the project, as well as Health Canada and Canada Health Infoway. We look forward to sharing the results of this important project over the next year.

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