The role of the informatics specialist in healthcare

The role of the informatics specialist in healthcare

Nursing informatics is a great resource for nursing in the hospital that I work. It helps us with documentation, medication administration, and much more. Being able to bring technology with nursing is beneficial for all of those involved with the care of patients including the patient.

Some examples of how nursing informatics specialists and floor nurses interact are education on new equipment, education on new programs in the eMAR and/or EHR, and unit council meetings. Recently, we received new beds in our units and they are very high-tech. There are so many program options that we had a specialist come to our facility and unit and educate the staff on the usage of the bed. Some of the features were using the bed to assist in turning the patient, integrated call light system, new features for the bed alarm, and many more. In our unit, we have council meetings that suggest various methods to help improve our unit. We usually have someone in management and an informatics personal at each meeting to hear our suggestions and address any issues.

One suggestion that I have to improve communication, especially regarding education, is more notice of changes. We are usually the last to know of any changes and I think if they ask us or inform us that they will be changing the bed or call system or anything technology-wise in the unit, it would be received better.

I believe that continued changes in nursing informatics and technology will be a positive impact on my unit. I’m still a firm believer that technology will not be able to replace personal/human touch or contact with the patient, however, it will help us assist our patients better. Being able to use the new beds to help us turn the patients or monitor the patients while in the bed helps with safety. Being able to show the patients videos while we educate on their condition helps with compliance.

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

Wang, Y. Kung, L., & Byrd, T. A. (2018). Big data analytics: Understanding its capabilities and potential benefits for healthcare organizations. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 126(1), 3–13. doi:10.1016/j.techfore.2015.12.019.

Examples of what other classmate has responded to this post:

Jeremy Dubose

RE: Discussion – Week 3

COLLAPSE

Response

Denise

Great Post. I could not agree with you more. The biggest issue I have with the technology specialist is poor communication. When I came to work last night, I almost discarded my original discussion post to write a new one about how we all came to work to find out that we had a scheduled downtime from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. It seems like they plan these downtimes, upgrades, and presentations at their convenience. They do it without any concern for the challenges it places on other departments. Proper communication is an essential factor in interprofessional collaboration (Bosh and Mansell, 2015).

Planning and ensuring that everyone is on the same page is important when introducing new technology or scheduling downtimes. Poor communication on scheduled downtimes can create confusion (Fahenholz et al., 2009). According to Milecarek, Badger and Gall (2015), noted that gaps during learning sessions between nurses, nursing informatics, and technology specialist include a lack of advance communication, lack of clarity about what needs to be done, and the lack of preparation for the learning session. The advance notice of a change is essential to the success of its implementation.

References

Bosch, B., & Mansell, H. (2015). Interprofessional collaboration in health care: Lessons to be learned from competitive sports. Canadian pharmacists journal : CPJ = Revue des pharmaciens du Canada : RPC, 148(4), 176–179. doi:10.1177/1715163515588106

Fahrenholz, C., Gregg; S., Lance, J., Tucker, K., & Warner, D. (2009). Plan B: A practical approach to downtime planning in medical practices. Journal of AHIMA 18(11), 34-38.

Mielcarek, F., Badger, M., & Gall, K. (2015). Outstanding practice-podium EHR downtime/recovery planning: panic prevention. Cin-Computers Informatics Nursing, 34(10), 433. Retrieved from

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