A Close Look at the Clinical Nurse Specialist Role (Podcast)

There are several options for nurses who are considering an advanced degree. One of those is to become a clinical nurse specialist.

A clinical nurse specialist (CNS) is an advanced practice nurse who practices within three spheres of influence – patient care, nursing and systems.

“Our expertise is in taking evidence-based practice and emerging trends, our own experience and knowledge, and really distilling that into best practice and then taking that and supporting the nurses around us to deliver that [high] level of care,” says Mindy Rivera, MSN, AGCNS, a clinical nurse specialist in pulmonary hypertension at Cleveland Clinic.

In this episode of Cleveland Clinic’s Nurse Essentials podcast, Rivera and Kayla Little, MSN, APRN, AGCNS-BC, PCCN, a clinical nurse in the Heart, Vascular and Thoracic Institute, discuss the CNS role. They delve into:

• The core tenets of being a clinical nurse specialist
• The difference between a nurse educator and a CNS
• The support a CNS can provide to clinical nurses, nurse leaders and healthcare organizations
• How a CNS helps improve nursing-sensitive quality indicators and align policies with evidence-based practices
• Steps to take to become a clinical nurse specialist

Click the podcast player above to listen to the episode now, or read on for a short, edited excerpt. Check out more Nurse Essentials episodes at my.clevelandclinic.org/podcasts/nurse-essentials or wherever you get your podcasts.

Podcast excerpt

Podcast host Carol Pehotsky, DNP, RN, NEA-BC: Whether I'm a brand-new nurse or more seasoned nurse, when should I be tapping into my local CNS? How can they help my practice as I'm at the bedside?

Little: The CNS can really help at any point in time, whether you are trying to discover what your next step is or what to do next with your patient, if it's a very complex patient scenario or how to do a procedure at the bedside, or you want to get a certification or you read an article and thought, "This seems like a good practice that we should implement at our institution.” Call your CNS, and they can help with that. So, really, we are good to call at any point in time.

And I think that as our role gets out there more and people are seeing us out on the units and at the hospital level, they are recognizing that we are easily accessible and always willing to help because if we don't have that good relationship with the nurse, then we don't know what needs to be changed.

Pehotsky: I can't be the nurse's nurse if I don't know what's going on.

Little: Exactly, yes. It’s very much we're working for you,

so reach out to us at any juncture.

Pehotsky: Well, when you think about wound care, advanced therapies, are there clinical nurse specialists that specialize in something like that?

Little: Yes, diabetes care, wound care – really any disease process, a clinical nurse specialist could be the guru for that.