leaders in health: dr. tracie risling plans to foster change by amplifying nurse voices
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tracie risling, the new president of the canadian nurses association, aims to amplify nurse voices to progress the career in a positive way.
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dr. tracie risling, the newly appointed president of the canadian nurses association, didn’t start out her professional life caring for others.
“i was actually a journalist before i was a nurse. it was a bit of an accident,” she says of how she got into the career she so fondly loves now. “i kind of stomped across the stage at my own nursing graduation and took this degree and thought, ‘how has this happened? how have i become a nurse?’”
she was placed working with pediatric patients, who “completely” captured her heart and mind, and she hit the ground running in her new career without looking back.
“there’s so many different kinds of nursing and different situations in nursing and different ways to show up as a nurse that you can happily be a nurse forever once you start down the road, which is what i discovered,” she said.
the nature of being part of someone’s health-care journey
dr. risling wanted her career in nursing to really mean something, partly because of her own desire to be as impactful as other nurses have been in her life, and partly because of her compassionate nature toward supporting others.
she is especially grateful to nurses who have had a significant impact on her life.
“i have nurses in my own story whose names i will never forget. the birth of each of my children, of course, being a standout there, but also moments in your family’s lives or others’ lives,” she said. “just how often and how impactful is something that’s really quiet about nursing.”
starting out her career in pediatrics, an area of the hospital called little peds at royal university hospital in saskatoon, sk, is where she says she “really became a nurse.”
“that zero to five crowd, boy, that’ll humble you real quick. there’s nothing like going toe to toe with a toddler on their own health and trying to convince them that this is in their best interest,” she said. “it was just such a brilliant place to learn to be a nurse.”
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along with hands-on care for her patients, dr. risling has also been involved in research, leadership and policy throughout her career, enabling her to tackle various aspects of nursing with passion and curiosity.
“it’s never a dull moment,” she said, later continuing, “we solve problems. we innovate. we provide care. we provide solutions. we work hard.”
being a part of something bigger
dr. risling notes that out of all the diversity that the nursing profession has, with so many different specializations and ways people can use their nursing degrees, she notes that one thing remains constant throughout: solidarity. nurses stand together because nurses just get nurses.
her career has also allowed her not only to lead but also to support other nurses through the university of calgary’s new doctor of nursing program.
“i’m incredibly proud to have been part of [that] and our first cohort of students just convocated this month,” she said. “five brand new shiny doctors of nursing, and they are incredible leaders already. that’s how the program was designed, and again, to be a part of the collaboration that helps to deliver those kinds of leaders into systems that need them, yeah, super proud.”
she’s also worked with the canadian nursing informatics association, an organization dedicated to helping propel research, practice and education in nursing so that all nurses across the country are well-equipped to perform their jobs at the highest standards, from frontline work to health policy and everything in between.
of her many jobs, dr. risling notes that her latest role, the president-elect of the canadian nurses association, is “deeply meaningful” for her.
“to see the respect that canada and canadian nursing have on the world stage and then to be a part of helping to make sure that the national association’s voice of nursing remains strong, i can almost think of nothing more important to me at this point in my career right now,” she said.
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while the rewards of the career are unmatched, it’s not without its challenges. given long-standing workforce challenges and limited opportunities for nurses to work to their full scope of practice, it’s not always easy to care for the population. the job itself is “hard work,” and nurses are continuously asked to do more.
“even the heroic, incredibly gritty nature of nurses cannot do all things all the time, and there has to be recognition of what is the capacity of nurses, given everything that they’re already managing to do one more thing,” said dr. risling. “i think we are beyond those limits right now, actually, and so i think that that’s something that we really need to think carefully about.”
to combat the issues faced by nurses today, dr. risling hopes to open up time using technology, but it can only be done when nurses’ voices are acknowledged.
“they say, ‘we’ll use this technology. it’ll free up time for nurses to spend with their patients.’ and i say, ‘just let me stop you at free up time. once you free up time, please let the nurses decide how they would like to spend that time. maybe it’s with their patients, and for many nurses, they would welcome and make a beeline to that extra time with their patients. maybe they would also actually like to get a coffee break or to have an opportunity to do some professional development and learning or to work on policy.”
she continued, “nurses are best positioned to decide.”
working toward a better future for nurses and patients in canada
dr. risling continues to be inspired by all the nurses she works with, and that inspiration is what she’s taken into her latest role. her primary goals revolve around unity, amplification and personification so that all nurses, regardless of designation or specialty, can realize their true power.
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“we don’t even realize what it looks like when we truly have an opportunity to provide structure, to have membership engagement across half a million nurses strong,” she said. “so, what i really would love is more unification, more nurses to join us, to join and engage in their membership with the cna.”
dr. risling, who is also a self-proclaimed “tech geek”, also aims to leverage technology in a way that doesn’t replace the humanity that nurses provide to patients and in health-care settings, but rather amplifies the type of care that they can provide.
“the world is at a really interesting, and i think, unparalleled, place right now with technology and change and transformation, and i think that nurses are an essential compass to leading this change,” she said. “nurses have a path forward, a holistic view forward that will help this technological transition come out to a better end, a more equitable, inclusive outcome for all of our health.”
it’s about integrating technology across the board, through systems, classrooms, leadership and administration, and all of that “needs a nurse.” without it, great tech is still just tech.
“the more that i’m able to amplify all the ways in which nurses and contribute to solutioning a better future, the better off we all will be.”
for example, artificial intelligence is increasingly adopted across industries, and in nursing it can play a significant role in addressing existing problems in health care, but without nurses’ eyes on it, it won’t be up to snuff.
“not only do nurses curate, collate … and provide much of the data in health care that these ai systems, for example, are being driven on. they have a holistic view of things that allows them to see when there is misrepresentation in data, when we have inequities, when data is missing, when there’s bias in the results,” she said.
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amplifying the voices of those in the profession is just one step of the process. it’s about really hearing those voices and learning from them in a way that fosters positive progress forward.
“i could spend the next two years, every single day, collecting stories of nursing, and i won’t even scratch the surface of the stories that exist just here in canada,” said dr. risling. “i want to hear those stories, learn from those stories … and i hope [other nurses] recognize that the cna is a home. it is a welcome home for every single nurse in canada to feel connected, to feel that pride, to feel like they have an opportunity to share what concerns they have and what they would like their association to do about it.”
a sense of community
as the new head of the canadian nurses association and an “action person”, dr. risling’s goal to ensure that nurses are heard when it comes to what they need to be able to provide the best care is all about listening and enacting change. and, being a nurse herself, she finds that the connection and camaraderie among those in the profession help keep her grounded in her approach when things get heavy, which they inevitably do working as a nurse.
“that busyness, those demands, that is something that all nurses share in all roles and in very different ways,” she said. “at its core, it’s about providing solutions and problem-solving and service and connectivity with people; those demands are very similar, so when i feel like i’m tired or i can’t, this is a shared experience. you really feel a connectivity through a community of nursing where nurses just get it.”
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