The Colorado Collaborative for Nursing Research: Nurses shaping nursing's future

Nurses in the present health care environment have been reduced too often to being providers of safe, competent care rather than quality care. In response, the Institute of Medicine has recommended that nurses become more involved in making changes to the health care system and use data more effectively. If nursing intends to follow these recommendations, the profession needs (a) fresh perspectives to assist in making health care system changes, (b) partnerships between nurse scientists and nurse clinicians to generate and implement data, and (c) capture of the proper value of nursing as distinct from other elements of health care delivery. The Colorado Collaborative for Nursing Research is an effort to meet the recommendations of the Institute of Medicine. The Colorado Collaborative for Nursing Research has a three-arm structure: a research forum where nurse academicians and nurse clinicians can launch collaborative projects; a research support services arm from which nurse collaborators can obtain help with modeling, statistics, writing, and funding; and a data extraction/data sharing mechanism to inform the decision making of nurse leaders.