Washington, DC – The AAN will present its 2008 media award to: Nurse: A World of Care (book and DVD) submitted by The Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing, Emory University and Bevel Up: Drugs, Users & Outreach Nursing submitted by Fanlight Productions.

Nurse: A World of Care celebrates the vital and often invisible work of nurses worldwide. Its original photography, words and music provide a compelling portrait of how nursing is at once crucial and imperiled; how the health of people around the world is at stake; and how challenges can be overcome when policy makers, the public, industry and the profession work together to address pressing issues. The core team behind the package includes award-winning editors, authors and photographers, along with Nobel Prize recipient and former President Jimmy Carter, Archbishop Desmond Tutu (another Nobel Prize winner) and Dr. Jean Yan, the World Health Organization’s Chief Scientist for Nursing and Midwifery.

The Street Nurse Program provides health care and prevention counseling related to HIV and sexually transmitted infections to drug users and other underserved urban populations wherever the need exists. The program – profiled in Bevel Up – sends nurses out directly to the young people, sex workers and homeless people living in alleys, shelters and skid row hotels. The documentary was designed to educate and mobilize student nurses and experienced nurses, outreach workers, health care professionals and policy makers – anyone working with or affecting the targeted patient population. Its audience now has moved beyond the nursing community, gaining wider acclaim. The program has been selected for the Hot Docs Film Festival and the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival, and received a PRISM Award for Original DVD (part of an annual recognition of outstanding media depiction of issues related to substance abuse and mental health). Bevel Up now is being distributed in the U.S. not only to health care organizations, but also to government, community and grass-roots groups.

The Academy's Media Award is presented to the individual(s) or organization(s) whose use of media during 2008 has highlighted the unique contribution of nursing and increased public awareness of the value nursing plays in promoting health and providing health care to the public. The award will be presented on November 8 at the Academy’s 35th Annual Meeting & Conference being held at the Westin Kierland Resort & Spa, Scottsdale, Arizona.

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The American Academy of Nursing (www.aannet.org) anticipates and tracks national and international trends in health care, while addressing resulting issues of health care knowledge and policy. The Academy’s mission is to serve the public and nursing profession by advancing health policy and practice through the generation, synthesis, and dissemination of nursing knowledge.

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