Unifying Nurses with Frontline Workers to Promote Equity

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted and exacerbated pre-existing disparities in global and U.S. societies. The inequities laid bare during the COVID-19 pandemic warrant a joint movement among nurses and the other frontline workers who maintained the functions of society throughout the crisis. Increasing the voice of the nursing workforce through collaborative leadership and advocacy could ameliorate many of the struggles facing the profession today while empowering frontline workers to address the needs facing their patient populations and communities. This article analyzes four key multidisciplinary conceptual frameworks that could bolster a collaborative movement toward equity while exploring example initiatives, current efforts, and the barriers between frontline workers and the equitable distribution of their services. The multidisciplinary frameworks analyzed in this article include Social Determinants of Health (SDOH), Health in All Policies (HiAP), Street-level Bureaucrats, and accumulation by dispossession. Recommendations for nursing, advocacy, and leadership practice include seeking interdisciplinary collaboration among frontline workers, developing interdisciplinary leadership groups, fostering cooperation between unions representing frontline fields, and supporting areas of nursing that function in multidisciplinary spaces. Nurses can impact equity by applying the SDOH lens and HiAP approach to the delivery of care, advocacy, and the development of policy, as well as continuing research regarding the role of nursing in interdisciplinary leadership, health equity, policy-making, and advocacy.