Abstract: This thesis is a study of the experiences of four cultural safety lecturers in nursing education in Aotearoa / New Zealand. A review of literature reveals the recent and turbulent evolution of cultural safety. The media which documented this journey in a negative light in the 1990s prompted ministerial inquiries and the publication of the Nursing Council of New Zealand's guidelines for cultural safety in nursing and midwifery education (1996). Action research methods enabled the participants to implement change in their practice and gain positive personal involvement in the study. Reflective diaries provided the major tool in this process as participants were able to achieve at least one action research cycle by identifying issues, planning action, observing the action and reflecting. The findings of the research revealed that the participants not only coped with every day stressors of teaching but they were also required to formulate knowledge of cultural safety. For the Maori participants their stress was confounded with recruiting and retaining Maori students and macro issues such as commitments to iwi. Lack of support to teach cultural safety was identified to be a key theme for all participants. An analysis of this theme revealed that it was organisational in nature and out of their immediate control. Action research provided a change strategy for participants to have a sense of control of issues within their practice. Recommendations have been made which focus on supporting cultural safety educators to dialogue on a regular basis through attendance at related hui; the introduction of nurse educator programmes; paid leave provisions for cultural safety educators to conduct and publish research so that a body of knowledge can be developed; and that Maori cultural safety educators be recognised for their professional and cultural strengths so that they do not fall victim to burn out.

Abstract: This paper reports the findings of a three-year longitudinal study of registered nurses studying on a part-time basis towards their Bachelor of Nursing degree. Registered General Nurses and Registered General and Obstetric Nurses have been subject to a good deal of pressure to upgrade their qualifications – from their workplaces, but also from a recognition amongst themselves and their peers that to advance in their careers they need to have equivalent qualifications to new graduates. This study looks at what difference academic study makes to registered nursing practice.

Abstract: The question explored in this research project is: What are inpatient registered nurses' perceptions of the factors which influence therapeutic relationship development? The literature reviewed for this project includes the history of interpersonal relationships in nursing; therapeutic relationships; what constitutes these relationships. Also discussed is literature about phenomenology as the underlying theoretical and philosophical position that informs the research method. To answer the research question a single focus group was used to gather data from a group of registered nurses practising in inpatient mental health units. Focus groups as a data collection method produce data and insights that would not be accessible without the group interaction. The key themes to emerge from the data analysis were; time, environment, knowing / self-awareness, compassion and power imbalance / empowerment. These key themes are discussed in relation to the literature and the wider context of the mental health care environment. The contribution this research makes to nursing includes a list of recommendations to nurses, nurse leaders and managers who aim to provide therapeutic mental health unit environments.

Abstract: A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree
of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF CANTERBURY 2003.
This thesis highlights the ways in which the practices of contemporary midwives in
Aotearoa/New Zealand are caught within the intersection of an array of competing discourses. The context for this is the reconstruction of midwifery in Aotearoa/New Zealand as an autonomous feminist profession founded on partnership with women. Interviews and participant observation with midwives, based mainly in one New Zealand city, are the basis of an analysis of the complexity of midwives? praxis as professionals. The analysis draws on insights from critical and feminist approaches to Foucault?s theories of discourse, power and the subject. It includes discussion of the conditions which came to produce and authorise the concept of ?partnership?. Which subjects can speak about partnership, and when? What claims
are made about it? What challenges it?

Abstract: Reports the approach to child and family health nursing in Canada, the US, and the UK. Divides the report into health policy, primary health care services, nursing education and the development of primary health care nurse practitioners, and nursing leadership in primary health care. Part of the Margaret May Blackwell Scholarship Reports series.