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Abstract: 

To ensure the delivery of highquality health care, nurse leaders must recruit and hire competent nursing staff. They must determine what staff members must know and be able to perform, and they must see that current and future staff members can meet these competencies. Nurse leaders must also ensure that nursing staff know what is legally demanded of them. They must verify that staff members understand that the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution guarantees prisoners the right to access care, the right to care that is ordered, and the right to professional judgment. Because the failure to meet these standards may constitute deliberate indifference (Rold, 2006), nurse leaders and a correctional institution’s medical staff should be familiar with all federal laws pertaining to inmate health care.

Keywords: American Nurses Association, National Commission on Correctional Health Care, competency-assessment tools, well-defined job description

Affiliations:  1: Near North Health Care Services.