This volume provides a comprehensive guide to advanced nursing practice in diverse rural settings worldwide. Part of the International Council of Nurses-endorsed APN Series, this volume explores the knowledge, skills, and theoretical foundations required to address the unique challenges and opportunities of healthcare delivery in rural, remote, and island communities.

The book examines the personal and professional realities of rural nursing, including practice in community and hospital settings, emergency care, public health, workforce development, and culturally safe care. It highlights the distinctive contribution of rural nurses and the importance of sustainable healthcare models that strengthen population health and community resilience in the face of climate change, disruption, and evolving health needs.

Organised into four parts, the volume first reviews advanced nursing practice globally, examining scopes of practice, education, competencies, regulation, and the diverse rural perspectives identified across WHO regions. It also explores the influence of culture, Indigenous perspectives, social determinants of health, and health inequities on rural healthcare.

The second part focuses on common rural clinical presentations and evidence-based approaches to care, supported by community engagement frameworks. The third examines technological and digital innovations that enhance healthcare delivery and collaboration across geographically dispersed settings. The final section addresses contemporary challenges affecting rural communities, including disruption, displacement, and changing health systems, and concludes with a reflective framework to support professional practice in evolving rural landscapes.

Designed for advanced practice nurses, educators, researchers, students, and policymakers, this book combines theory, practical guidance, case examples, and lived experiences to support excellence in rural healthcare. By recognising the crucial role of nurses in caring for nearly half of the world's population living outside major urban centres, this volume offers an essential resource for advancing practice, leadership, and innovation in rural, remote, and island contexts.

Jean Ross a Professor of Nursing, originally from Wales, UK. Jean has more than 30 years’ experience of working with the rural nursing workforce in New Zealand. The cumulation of her work associated with rural nursing, includes activism, research, and education. Education includes undergraduate, postgraduate and doctoral engagement. Jean’s initial work with rural nurses commenced in Wales and continued with the establishment as co-director of the Centre for Rural Health in New Zealand in 1994 funded by the Southern Regional Authority and the National Centre for Rural Health in 1999, funded by the Ministry of Health, New Zealand. Jean is an advocate for sustainable rural community engagement and nurse education. Jean’s focus is research directive which both informs and directs her practice. Jean has the capacity to network nationally and internationally, she brings colleagues and community stakeholders together which is demonstrated in her book publications including, Rural Nursing: Aspects of Practice dedicates a space for rural research to be presented, while being the first rural textbook published in New Zealand. Stories of Nursing in Rural Aotearoa: A Landscape of Care promotes rural health and in particular rural nursing practice. Equally, Growing Rural Health Tipu Haere Tuawhenua Hauora: 30 Years of Advocacy and Support in Aotearoa has captured rural activism amongst health professionals and the support of rural communities. Her most recent publication Rural landscapes of community health: The community health assessment sustainable education (CHASE) model in action showcases a novel method of engaging rural communities in partnership with nurse learners in community development. Jean enhances collaborative relationships in the global landscape informing nursing curricula, and teaching and learning pedagogy internationally with a view to reduce health disparities.    

Roland Preston has 40 years clinical experience both nationally and internationally practicing both at specialist and advanced practice level in critical care, anaesthesia and domiciliary ventilatory support.  Roland has over 7 years’ experience supporting patients requiring domiciliary ventilatory support in both urban and rural locations utilising technologies from telehealth to remote monitoring and diagnostics.  Roland has been involved in academia for 27 years with 22 years spent as a lecturer practitioner before final moving into a full-time lecturer role as deputy programme lead for advanced practice and then as senior lecturer for advanced practice and rural advanced practice with the university of the Highlands and Islands. Academically Roland has designed and implemented a variety of graduate and post graduate courses in critical care and respiratory disorders, advanced practice and most recently was part of the development team designing a MSc Rural Advanced practitioner programme which is the first programme of its type within the UK. Roland is passionate about rural advanced practice and its development he is also an advanced life support instructor and has a keen interest in interprofessional clinical simulation as part of the education preparation of both undergraduate and post graduate practitioners. 

Lizanne Hamilton-Smith has 30 years of a varied nursing and academic career havingcompleted her registered nurse education within Glasgow Royal Infirmary in 1990. She has continued to work within a vast range of different interdisciplinary areas gaining extensive experience, teaching and advanced clinical skills. Lizanne can reduce harmful variations and costs within the healthcare service by implementing project management skills and utilising transformational communication skills to modernise and implement change in various successful projects. Currently Senior Lecturer and external examiner roles within various Higher Education Institutions. Chair the interdisciplinary advanced practice continuous professional development workshops which has evolved incorporate a national and international audience. Her advancing career, experience, knowledge, and motivation remains to influence current and future advanced practice across a wide range of positive national and international opportunities. Lizanne is an integral member of the advanced practice community and undertaking various research projects including the impact of Observed Structured Clinical Examinations; developing Learning Disabilities competencies for advanced practice; and advanced practice doctoral support. Equally her teaching focus has enhanced her extensive healthcare experience transformed her role into delivering innovative, creative, and hybrid teaching, learning and assessment strategies for the pre and post registration nursing curriculums. Presently undertaking professional doctorate (PhD) studies to research the perceptions and values of the advanced nurse practitioner in Scotland.

Fiona Doolan‑Noble is a UK‑trained nurse with an extensive career in rural and remote health service management, research, and education. Her professional trajectory spans frontline nursing, senior health system leadership, and applied rural health research across the UK, New Zealand and Australia, providing a strong practical and policy‑relevant foundation for scholarship on advanced practice nursing in rural and remote contexts. A qualitative rural health researcher, Fiona’s work consistently centres on the realities of practice in small rural and remote communities. Her research has explored moral distress among rural and remote nurses, workforce sustainability, community wellbeing, multimorbidity, ageing, and the impacts of system‑level disruptions on rural communities, with a sustained focus on equity and pragmatic solutions to improve care delivery in resource‑constrained settings. Fiona has held senior academic leadership roles within nationally significant rural and population health research centres and is widely recognised for her contribution to translating rural health service research into policy and practice. She is also a leader in rural interprofessional education, having designed and led longitudinal, place‑based learning models that reflect the scope, autonomy, and complexity of advanced practice roles in rural settings. In 2023, she relocated to rural Western Australia to establish the Goldfields University Department of Rural Health [GUDRH] in Kalgoorlie for Curtin University. In this role, she continues to work closely with rural and remote clinicians, health services, communities, and universities to strengthen advanced practice capability, workforce development, and context‑responsive models of care.