Suzi Birz, principal, HiQ Analytics, LLC
Information technology (IT) has become an integral part of modern health care. From electronic medical records to remote monitoring devices, nurses need to learn the technology of the profession, along with human biology and the standards of patient care.
Advances in healthcare IT have called for technology to take center stage as nursing programs begin to add IT education to curriculum and classes.
The U. S. Department of Health and Human Services states that the broad use of health IT will:
• Improve health care quality
• Prevent medical errors
• Reduce health care costs
• Increase administrative efficiencies
• Decrease paperwork and
• Expand access to affordable care.
In recognition of the changing patient care delivery environment, several groups have outlined the need to change nursing education.
The National League for Nursing issued a position statement in May 2008 entitled “Preparing the Next Generation of Nurses to Practice in a Technology-Rich Environment: An Informatics Agenda.”
The Technology Informatics Guiding Educational Reform (TIGER) Initiative, supported by the Alliance for Nursing Informatics (ANI) and several major nursing organizations, aims to enable practicing nurses and nursing students to fully engage in the unfolding digital electronic era in healthcare.
As these group efforts get underway, individual nursing schools are also starting to update their curriculums.
Rush University College of Nursing, for instance, based in Chicago, Illinois, recently added its first informatics course. “The course was added both in response to the Essentials for Doctoral Education for Advanced Practice and the TIGER Initiative which states the need to enable nurses to use informatics in education and practice for safe, quality patient care,” said Elizabeth Carlson, Ph.D., RN, a faculty member at Rush University. “The course focused on why informatics and technology are important to nurses in meeting the goals outlined by the Institute of Medicine including safety, effectiveness, patient-centeredness, timeliness, efficiency and equity.”
“The course includes project management, deployment life cycle, installation, purpose of the technology and role of the nurse,” explained instructor Amy Stiner, RN, MBA, MPH.. “The projects are designed to have students interact with institutions that have technology in progress or in place to learn first-hand about the process and the role of clinicians. They can also understand the systems and implementation decisions made, as well as the important nursing contribution to making those projects successful, and the impact of the technology.”
The students enter the program expecting a technology infrastructure as part of their education, knowing they have to use the technology when they enter the work environment.
The informatics course at Rush is conducted online. “While computer literacy is not covered in the course, this teaching method helps ensure the students have basic computer skills and the college has a level of technology infrastructure,” explained Carlson.
“The students expect the instructors to be at least as savvy as they are and demonstrate it in the classroom,” said Carlson. “In the same way that students expect the instructor to demonstrate nurse charting on a flow sheet, they expect the instructor to demonstrate charting in an electronic medical record.”
It is not enough to teach computer literacy, information literacy and informatics in the classroom. Another important aspect is to apply the concepts. “It is expected that when a student is placed in a clinical setting, the student will have access to how practicing nurses operate each day,” added Carlson. “If the nurses use an electronic medical record, the students will have access to the system.”
“Patient care is the most important part of nursing education, but we need to guard against falling short in other skill areas that are needed to be effective in health care, including project management, politics, budgeting, the roles of suppliers and leadership,” noted Stiner. “By including project management and the IT development life cycle, this course paints the entire picture related to health care technology.”
“The class was well received by the students,” said Carlson. “It is our goal to offer the course regularly and have graduates of any program in the Rush College of Nursing take an informatics course.”
Read more about National League for Nursing Position Statement, the TIGER Initiative, and Rush University: College of Nursing.
© 2008. AMN Healthcare, Inc. All Rights Reserved.