It is an honor to be appointed the seventh Editor-in-Chief of Home Healthcare Nurse. We bid farewell to Tina Marrelli who is stepping down after eight years of dedicated service to the journal. I want to thank and recognize Tina for all her hard work and commitment to HHN as well as for her assistance during this transition. I look forward to continuing her work, along with that of the editorial board members, reviewers and publisher Kathleen Phelan, to bring you a journal that is the go-to resource for home healthcare clinicians.
While I want to continue Tina's fine work, I want to ask you, the reader, what you want to see in future issues of HHN. What are the topics important to you and your practice? Please share your ideas with me. Email me at mailto:[email protected]. I also hope you will consider submitting a manuscript for publication, either alone or in a team. We know that no single profession is responsible for good patient outcomes - it takes a team of professionals, working together, each with their own area of expertise. The same could be said for writing a manuscript for publication. One member of the team may have the necessary writing skills, another the organizational skills to keep the project rolling, and another may have the skills to search the existing literature. I know that writing for publication isn't always a priority for busy health care providers, but the truth is, you are the best judge of what is important for a quality journal in your field. With that said, I would also invite you to consider volunteering as a manuscript reviewer. Every article printed in HHN is peer-reviewed. This means two or three content experts review the manuscript for quality, accuracy, and clarity before it is published. If you would like to serve as a reviewer, email me with your current position, area of expertise and contact information.
You will notice two new departments in this issue. The first is Consult PRN. The purpose of this column is to answer questions about clinical, legal, and ethical issues and dilemmas that home healthcare clinicians face. If you would like to ask a question, email me and we will get the answer from an expert in the appropriate field. The second new department is Focus on Diabetes. We all know that a large proportion of home healthcare patients have been diagnosed with diabetes. The American Diabetes Association tells us that 25.8 millions adults and children in the United States have one of the forms of diabetes, with type 2 being the type most likely to go undiagnosed. The column this month focuses on the proper names for the various types of diabetes. As with Consult PRN, if you have a question for our diabetes experts, email me and they'll do their best to answer it.
Finally, I want to send a shout-out to all the Occupational Therapists (OT) out there as we celebrate OT month during the month of April. Your many contribution to home healthcare are highly valued by your clinician colleagues, patients and families.