At the June 5th meeting of the Greater Tampa Oncology Nursing Society, selected clinical exemplars will be presented by oncology nurses. An exemplar is a story written to describe a clinical situation where the nurse learned something about her/his practice or made a significant contribution to patient care.

Patricia Benner states, "A wealth of knowledge is embedded in the practices and the 'know how' of expert clinicians, but this knowledge will not expand or fully develop unless nurses systematically record what they learn from their own experience.

Benner and Gordon suggest the following guidelines for choosing the topic of your story:
* An incident in which you feel your intervention really made a difference in a patient outcome, either directly or indirectly
* An incident that went unusually well
* An incident in which things did not go as planned
* An incident that is very ordinary and typical
* An incident that you think captures the essence of nursing
* An incident that was particularly demanding

When telling your story, include:
* Details about the setting in which the incident took place (e.g. shift, time of day, type of unit, etc.)
* A detailed description of what happened
* Why the incident was "critical" or important to you
* What your concerns were at the time
* What you were thinking as it was taking place
* What you were feeling during and after the incident
* What, if anything, you found most demanding about the situation

Exemplars should be 250 to 1000 words in length. They do not have to be typewritten but legibilty is required!
Send your exemplar to:

Greater Tampa Chapter
Oncology Nursing Society
Tampa, Florida 33682-2984

Deadline for submission of exemplars is April 1, 1997. You will be notified by May 1, 1997 if your exemplar is selected for presentation. Please consider sharing your story with your colleagues!!