Forensic Nursing

The field of forensic nursing has become increasingly popular since the last decade of the twentieth century, and is predicted to continue to be one of the fastest growing and most desirable nursing specialties.

In 1992, a group met in Minneapolis for the first convention of sexual assault nurses. One of the meeting's outcomes was the creation of the term, and the specialty, of forensic nursing. Another outcome was the inception of the International Association of Forensic Nurses (IAFN). The IAFN is the only international professional registered nurses' organization created with the specific goals of developing, advancing, and disseminating information about the science of forensic nursing. In 1995, forensic nursing was recognized as a clinical specialty by the American Nurses Association.

A growing number of schools of nursing offer training , certificates, or advanced degrees in the area of forensics. Some of the specialty areas within forensic nursing include: forensic clinical nurse specialist, forensic nurse investigator, nurse coroner/death investigator, sexual assault nurse examiner (SANE), sexual assault response team member (SART), legal nurse consultant, forensic gerontology specialist, forensic psychiatric nurse, and correctional nursing specialist.

Specialized forensic nursing coursework and practical training typically include advanced training in the identification of traumatic wounding, including training in recognition of patterned wounds, and injuries in various stages of healing (it is not uncommon in domestic violence situations to see victims with fresh, relatively new, and older healing injuries). Forensic nurses are trained to objectively, record a complete chronology of the injuries from the victim, patient, parent, legal guardian, or caregiver; they (forensic nurses) are often skilled at crime victim photography . This experiential combination makes them valuable expert witnesses in court proceedings.

In 2002 the Forensic Nursing Certification Board (FNCB) had its inception. The mission of the FNCB is to uphold the highest standards of both the science and the clinical practice of forensic nursing, via the creation, utilization, promulgation, and assessment of every aspect of the forensic nursing certification (and re-certification) process.

It is the stated philosophy of the FNCB that the clinical specialty of forensic nursing encourages attainment of the ultimate standards of nursing practice in order to deliver the best possible patient care. The FNCB seeks to standardize the coursework, training, and practice of forensic nursing in order to provide a common knowledge and experiential base. This, in turn, will lead to uniformly superior skill levels in the field. As a result of this professional standardization, the attainment of forensic nurse certification will be professionally (and legally) meaningful.

Quite often, work as a SANE or SART nurse provides an entry point into forensic nursing. Through the course of their work, SANE and SART nurses interact with coroners, members of law enforcement, judges, district attorneys, victims' advocates, criminal and civil attorneys; this is an ideal way to segue into forensic nursing. The SANE-A credential, a professional certification conferred by the FNCB, is given to sexual assault nurse examiners with adolescent and adult expertise. It indicates achievement of the most stringent standards of forensic nursing expertise in the field of sexual assault nurse examination, resulting in professional board certification.

Forensic nurses often interact with those involved in rape, child and elder abuse, domestic violence, and trauma associated with violent crimes. The work of forensic nurses can vary widely, from providing (typically emergency) care to both crime victims and perpetrators, to collecting or photographing evidence for law enforcement agencies, to performing death investigations, to providing support for emergency workers at crisis settings, to counseling schoolchildren who use weapons, to providing physical (and sometimes behavioral health) care in the correctional system, to acting as legal nurse consultants and expert witnesses in the court system.

They may provide direct nursing services to individuals, act as professional consultants to nursing, medical, legal, and law enforcement agencies, or provide expert witness testimony in court settings regarding trauma, questioned death investigations, adequacy, and appropriateness of service delivery, and offer diagnostic opinions on issues pertaining to specific nursing-related conditions.

Forensic nurses are particularly valuable in the emergency medical setting, as health care professionals are typically taught to clean and treat wounds and injuries, resulting in loss of valuable evidence and, sometimes, leading to an inability to prosecute crimes. Forensic nurses are trained to photograph and meticulously document trauma and injuries, to collect, to preserve, and to properly package evidence.

Clinical forensic nursing involves applying standard clinical nursing theory and practice to the complex treatment of trauma, or to the investigation of death, of victims or perpetrators of criminal violence, child, elder, and domestic abuse, and traumatic accidents. Forensic nurses interact with the legal justice and law enforcement systems regularly.

Forensic nursing, a specialty field steadily gaining in both importance and popularity, is of significant importance whenever and wherever clinical nursing and the law enforcement (and legal) systems interact.

see also Accident reconstruction; Careers in forensic science; Crime scene cleaning; Paternity evidence; Photography; Physical evidence; Rape kit.