NMBI Voice – Podcast. May 4th 2026
Chief Nurse (Rachel Kenna) on Policy Power
Irish nurses and midwives face constant pressure to innovate and improve the nation’s health system while maintaining high standards of care. Achieving genuine policy change requires the lived experience of front-line professionals to be heard and acted upon.
This episode delves into the critical role nurses and midwives play in shaping high-level health policy, leading workforce reform, and embracing a digital future. Chief Nurse Rachel Kenna discusses the success of advanced practice in improving patient access, the 47 recommendations from the Expert Review Body, and why optimism must overcome fear regarding AI and technology in healthcare.
In this podcast episode, at approximately 19 minutes into the recording, Rachel Kenna delivers a powerful endorsement of advanced practice, positioning Advanced Nurse and Midwife Practitioners as indispensable to the future of Irish healthcare. She emphasises that ANPs and AMPs are providing autonomous, expert-level clinical care, expanding patient access, driving innovation, and fundamentally reshaping healthcare delivery across Ireland.
She further highlights that advanced practitioners are not only improving patient outcomes, but are also influencing national healthcare policy, leading service reform, and exemplifying the highest standards of professional nursing and midwifery leadership. Her remarks firmly establish advanced practice as a strategic pillar of modern healthcare and a critical solution to ongoing workforce and service pressures within the Irish health system.
