Leadership and Collaboration CANCER NURSING Other Projects and Activities Research & Education Lead: Professor Meinir As Research & Education Lead, Professor Krishnasamy Krishnasamy, University of Melbourne is leading a Cancer Australia-supported project that brings together three VCCC hospitals to develop an online resource for older cancer patients. Professor Krishnasamy also worked with senior nurses from Peter Mac, Austin Health and the Royal Melbourne Hospital to progress plans for capacity building with nurses, including nursing grand rounds, strategic research frameworks and hospital hubs. As a champion for nurse-led research at the University of Melbourne, she also supported a number of nurse- led research initiatives across multiple VCCC partners. Phase I Priorities 2017–18 These included nine individual research projects; three nursing research internships, and support for three •Understanding Cancer Patient Complexity senior nurses to register for PhDs at the university. •Development of Building Nursing Research Capability Program Professor Krishnasamy is VCCC Chair of Cancer Nursing at the University of Melbourne, and SRP program KEY ACTIVITIES champion for Building Nursing Research Capability. Exploring Patient Complexity Priorities set for 2017–18 generated A symposium in August 2017 brought together 20 considerable visibility and momentum invited participants including nurse directors, advanced for cancer nursing research. Significant practice and specialist cancer nurses, workforce gains made in strategic direction and managers and researchers from across the seven implementation of nursing research clinical partners of the VCCC. There was unanimous and education in line with identified support to develop a pilot program to test the feasibility and clinical utility of a patient care complexity index. opportunities, strengths, needs and gaps Efforts to secure funding to support this are ongoing. across seven clinical partners. Development of Building Nursing Research Capability Program Nurses engaged in research can play a valuable role in improving healthcare delivery and patient outcomes. Consultation led by Professor Krishnasamy across the clinical partners highlighted the need for systematic support to enable them to investigate valuable clinical questions. This led to the inclusion of a program under the SRP dedicated specifically to building nursing research capability (refer to page 34) to improve research literacy and help overcome some of the barriers to nurse-led research. 19