BEYOND ORIENTATION: SUPPORT FOR THE NURSE Hegarty, EJ; Kota, NM Abstract: Standards and guidelines exist to identify best practice in patient care. Evidenced based practice relies on utilizing those standards to improve care for a specific patient population. However, providing consistent nursing care, based on those standards, to the obstetrical patient population in a tertiary care center can be a challenging task for both new and experienced nurses. To advance on the clinical ladder, a staff nurse collaborated with novice and experienced nurses and Education Services on this project. A 120 page pocket reference was developed using AWHONN standards of practice, evidence-based institutional policies and procedures, and well-known perinatal reference materials. It contained a wide variety of topics including scope of practice, medication administration, fetal monitoring guidelines, routine newborn care and OB Emergencies. The goal of this project is to reference consistent nursing practice, support the new nurse during and after completing the orientation process, and strengthen uniformity in practice of the experienced nurses. This presentation will discuss the effectiveness of this guide by evaluating user satisfaction from the standpoint of the new graduate nurse as well as the experienced perinatal nurse. It will also discuss the impact of such a tool on consistency of nursing practice for an inpatient LDRP unit.