Pediatric nursing focuses on the protection, promotion, and optimization of the health and abilities for children from newborn age through young adulthood. Utilizing a patient- and family-centred care approach, pediatric nurses strive for preventing illness and injury, restoring health, and maximizing comfort in health conditions and at the end of life, through diagnosis, treatment, and management of the child's condition and advocacy in the care of children and families.

ANA and a workgroup of pediatric nurse experts, from across their specialty and representing seven professional organizations, convened to update and expand the 2008 edition to accommodate ongoing and anticipated changes in their specialty and health care. With input from numerous nurses, they developed the second edition of Pediatric Nursing, a comprehensive delineation of the competent level of practice and professional performance common to and expected from pediatric registered nurses in all practice levels and settings.

The publication's scope of practice addresses what is expected of all pediatric nurses, specifying the who, what, where, when, why, and how of their practice. That detailed discussion of the scope of practice gives the context - the underlying assumptions, characteristics, environments and settings, education and training requirements, key issues and trends, and ethical and conceptual bases of pediatric nursing - needed to understand and use the standards.

Those 16 standards, which offer a framework for evaluating practice outcomes and goals, are those by which all pediatric nurses are held accountable for their practice. The set of specific competencies accompanying each standard serves as evidence of minimal compliance with that standard. A foundational volume that is primarily for those directly involved with pediatric nursing practice, education, and research, other nurses and allied healthcare providers, researchers, and scholars will find value in this content. It is also a resource for employers, insurers, lawyers, policy makers, regulators, and stakeholders involved in pediatric care.

About ANA's Specialty Nursing Standards

Since the late 1990s, ANA has partnered with other nursing organizations to establish a formal process for recognition of specialty areas of nursing practice. This includes the criteria for approving the specialty itself and the scope statement, and an acknowledgment by ANA of the standards of practice for that specialty. Because of the significant changes in the evolving nursing and healthcare environments, ANA's approval of specialty nursing scope statements and its acknowledgment of specialty standards of practice remain valid for five years, starting from the publication date of the documents.

The standards in this publication are based on language from ANA's Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice, Second Edition, a helpful supplement to this specialty text, which in turn is of optimal use with two complementary ANA texts: Nursing's Social Policy Statement and Guide to the Code of Ethics for Nurses. Together, these three books help guide nursing practice, thinking, and decision-making. The set is proving useful as a professional reference, classroom textbook, in-service training guide, and credentialing exam resource.

Co-published with the National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners (NAPNAP) and the Society of Pediatric Nurses (SPN).