Module 1 Healthcare Technology

Module 1 Healthcare Technology

Beth Martin RE: Discussion – Week 1

Module 1 Healthcare Technology

Healthcare Information Technology is always evolving and changes rapidly in today’s world. All healthcare workers rely on HIT to do a large portion of their job. One of the main reasons nurses need data to take care of patients is safety (Glassman, 2017). When we use previous data to show what has worked or has not worked previously with patients, nurses can then make decisions on their practice efforts based on these results. Previous experience or knowledge can also be used to provide effective data (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017). Healthcare is always evolving and information changes continuously (Laureate,2018). There are various ways data is used in nursing to improve safety. Data can pull together with information about a patient and alert the nurse that they may be a fall risk, or that their vital signs and labs may show patient deterioration.

One-way nurses can use data is to provide safe patient assignments based on acuity. Staffing and heavy patient loads are one of the leading causes of nurse burnout. Turnover of nurses is not only costly; it can cause an increase in patient dissatisfaction and safety concerns and the continuum of care is not happening. Having a high acuity of patients can also be a safety issue as the nurse is not able to deliver adequate care to each of his or her patients. The use of the EHR could help with collecting pertinent information to see how much time a patient is needing for care. Medication administration times and route, the seriousness of the illness, falls risk, mobility assistance, cognition, upcoming procedures, help with feeding and meals, are just some of the ways collected data could help with safer assignments. A nurse informatician can help to translate information to the electronic health record by gathering data such as this and the relaying it in a way that can be used for knowledge to make an informed decision on how to best care for patients (Public Health informatics Institute, 2017). Data can be revisited and updated to see if any improvements need to be made for patient care.

Glassman, K., (2018) Using Data in Nursing Practice American Nurse Retrieved by https://www.myamericannurse.com/using-data-nursing-practice/

Laureate Education (2018) Health Informatics and Population Health: Trends in Population Health [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.

McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K. G. (2017). Nursing informatics and the foundation of knowledge pp.9 (4th ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning.

Public Health Informatics Institute (2017) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v+fLUygA8Hpfo