Dr Christoph von Dach

Dr Christoph von Dach works at the Solothurner Spitäler AG in Solothurn, Switzerland as deputy director of Nursing. He leads the practice development unit for the hospital group. Currently he provides the implementation of person-centred culture at his hospital. Therefore, he is also part of steering German spoken steering committee to provide the translation and the cultural adaption of the PCP Framework (McCormack and McCance, 2017) and other key contents of person-centred care into German language. He also is lecturer at the university of applied science Bern, Switzerland with the main focus on advanced nursing practice. He have worked as a professional in nursing his whole career. His specializations are in the fields of oncology, palliative care, spirituality in nursing and clinical leadership. Before he started his Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) education, he worked for 22 years as a nursing director in a hospital for oncology (Lukas Klinik, Arlesheim, Switzerland). After that, he changed to the University Hospital Zurich, Switzerland. In this new position, he had worked firstly as a project manager to implement an interprofessional palliative care consultation service for the hospital. After that he was responsible for the practice development in nursing as head of practice development. Therefore he was included into the center of clinical nursing research which also belonged to the university hospital. His task was to lead a group of about 50 clinical nurse specialists.

The responsibility included the development of clinical nursing in the different fields and specialties of a university hospital, the implementation of evidence into practice, the creation and evaluation of clinical guidelines and the development of new nursing roles. Within that he started two projects for implementing a nurse practitioner (NP) into surgical units. These two NP roles were some of the first roles in the German-speaking part of Switzerland.

Currently, he is in charge as deputy director of nursing and head of practice development for the hospital group. In this position, he leads the practice development unit. Practice development in Switzerland involves:

• Implementing evidence into practice
• Clinical leadership
• Developing clinical nursing
• Developing new roles
• Creating and evaluating clinical guidelines for our hospital
• Providing clinical research
• National and international networking

Especially in the Solothurner Spitäler AG this includes also the implementation of a person-centered culture in nursing.