Assessment 1: Nursing Informatics in Healthcare Essay

Quality care delivery is a multifaceted and interdisciplinary endeavor that consists of multiple dimensions, including reducing care costs, ensuring timely access, and eliminating barriers to care effectiveness and efficiency. According to Hübner et al. (2022), healthcare professionals engage in interdisciplinary activities for advancing patient care, including leveraging practical evidence and shifting focus toward adding value to care. Amidst the ever-increasing demand for quality and convenient care, nursing informatics emerges as a profound strategy for promoting the incorporation of data, information, and knowledge into nursing practice (Hübner et al., 2022). Also, it justifies the widespread use of advanced health information technologies in improving patient care, and workflow, and increasing the return on investment in the healthcare sector.

Nursing Informatics and the Nurse Informaticists

Nursing informatics is an ambiguous term that originally lacked a universal definition. However, the International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) developed a comprehensive definition of nursing informatics in 1998. According to Hübner et al. (2022), the IMIA defines nursing informatics as “the science and practice that integrates nursing, its information and knowledge, and their management with information and communication technologies to promote the health of people, families, and communities worldwide” (p. 4). Based on this definition, it is valid to associate nursing informatics with information management, communication technology, and the improvement of people’s health and wellness.

Since 1998, the definition of nursing informatics has evolved to incorporate advancements in health information technology, professional competencies, and organizational information structures and systems. In 2015, the American Nurses Association (ANA) provided a more insightful definition of nursing informatics. According to McGonigle & Mastrian (2018), ANA defined nursing informatics (NI) as a specialty that entails the integration of multiple information and analytical sciences to identify, define, manage, and communicate data, information, knowledge, and wisdom in nursing practice. In this sense, NI is a profound concept that supports information structures, processes, and technologies to promote interdisciplinary collaboration and the achievement of desired outcomes.

The perspective of nursing informatics as a specialty means that healthcare professionals should develop unique sets of skills and competencies that allow them to navigate information systems, leverage data, and translate data into knowledge and wisdom. Equally, specialists in nursing informatics should undertake various responsibilities that render them an essential part of an interdisciplinary team. The responsibilities of nursing informatics specialists include managing information technology (IT) projects, enhancing data confidentiality, security, and integrity standards, analyzing data and processes to enhance care decisions, and customizing health information systems (Hübner et al., 2022). Other profound roles include communicating regulatory and IT requirements, improving communication effectiveness with other professionals, and evaluating the applicability and efficiency of information systems.

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Nurse Informaticists and Other Healthcare Organizations

Healthcare organizations use nursing informatics as a strategy for improving care quality and enhancing their competitive advantages. In this sense, nursing informatics specialists use information technology and data systems to translate data into information, knowledge, and wisdom, manage clinical processes consistent with the overarching objective of making evidence-based decisions, and improve health intelligence by using digital metrics, alongside real-time information streams from advanced technological modalities, including artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms (Hübner et al., 2022). Other possibilities that emerge from the use of nursing informatics in other healthcare organizations are predictive models that enable healthcare professionals to diagnose health conditions, predict disease transmission patterns, and make informed preventive decisions. These considerations necessitate the need to strengthen the role of nurse informatics specialists in the current healthcare systems.

Impact of Full Nurse Engagement in Healthcare Technology

Nurses understand the demands in the healthcare sector, as well as the intricacies of selecting and advancing information systems and technologies. As a result, engaging them in healthcare technology can improve system usability, eliminate the need for workarounds, and alleviate failures (Dykes & Chu, 2020). Further, nurses’ full engagement in healthcare technology impacts various aspects, including patient care, protected health information, workflow, costs, and return on investment.

Patient care

Health information technologies (HITs) are vital tools for improving care quality, considering their inputs in process efficiency, timeliness, and accuracy. According to Farokhzadian et al. (2020), information technology enhances the quality and efficiency of medical services and care by reducing clinical risks and errors, maintaining care continuity, facilitating communication between healthcare professionals and patients, and transforming record-keeping, information management, and documentation activities. As a result, nurses’ involvement in health technology is a profound dimension of transforming care delivery landscapes to achieve the overarching objectives of patient-centered, safer, and efficient care.

Protected health information (security, privacy, and confidentiality)

The management of protected health information (PHI) is a priority for healthcare professionals and organizations, considering the lurking threats and barriers to data security, privacy, and confidentiality. Healthcare technology can promote data integrity by ensuring uniformity in data management practices. Farokhzadian et al. (2020) argue that health information technologies provide information networks necessary for conducting nursing research and calculating quality indicators. By involving nurses in health information technology, it is possible to promote the interdisciplinary collaboration necessary for implementing various PHI safeguards, including administrative, physical, and technical. Moore & Frye (2019) identify access authorization and monitoring, access badges, passwords, data encryption, proper disposal of documents, development of data backup plans, recovery and restoration policies, and security awareness training as evidence-based practices for enhancing data security, privacy, and confidentiality. These strategies require input from all healthcare stakeholders, including nurses.

Workflow

Healthcare workflow entails multiple tasks that form the basis of value delivery and patient care. These activities include consultations, billing, admissions, appointment management, and record keeping. Health information technology (HIT) can improve healthcare workflow by supporting process automation and eliminating over-reliance on paperwork. According to Farokhzadian et al. (2020), HIT creates precise and secure record-keeping systems, reduces workload and paperwork, and optimizes fundamental medical activities, including diagnoses, billing, and treatment plans. These impacts reduce care delays, alleviate data loss, prevent burnout, and improve the coordination of clinical processes and activities.

Costs and return on investment

Healthcare organizations and professionals have a responsibility to reduce care costs while achieving a return on investment. Often, health institutions incur additional costs associated with care delays, medication errors, and data losses. Health information technology (HIT) can save time and alleviate costs by speeding up tasks, improving process accuracy, and providing advanced modalities for data management and record keeping (Farokhzadian et al., 2020). Reduced care costs, improved workflows, care timeliness, and technology-mediated convenient care are elements of the return on investment for healthcare organizations.

Opportunities and Challenges

The concept of nursing informatics, alongside the role of nurses and nursing informatics specialists, has a plausible future due to the limitless opportunities for health information technology (HIT). According to Iuppa & Suresh (2022), nursing informaticists lead interprofessional teams in leveraging evidence to transform data and information into knowledge and insights. Equally, the widespread use of clinical technologies necessitates the need to promote systems usability and information interoperability. Other opportunities for nurses, nursing informatics specialists, and interprofessional teams include data visualization and analysis, new technology support, the current shift from in-person care to visual services, and the need to implement user-centric system designs.

However, nurses, nursing informatics specialists, and interdisciplinary teams face multiple challenges when capitalizing on the opportunities for nursing informatics and technologies. Inadequate training, limited organizational support, unfavorable organizational policies, procedures, and culture, poor timing of HIT adaptation, and constraints on computing hardware and software infrastructure are among the challenges facing nursing informatics in the current healthcare systems (Zadvinskis et al., 2018). Healthcare organizations should address these complexities to capitalize on the importance of nursing informatics in improving patient care and workflow, safeguarding data integrity, and achieving a return on investment.

Summary of Recommendations

Based on the opportunities for nursing informatics specialists, nurses, and other members of an interdisciplinary team in using nursing informatics, it is valid to make the following recommendations to the organization’s human resource manager and chief nursing officer (CNO); hire more nursing informatics specialists, enhance awareness training programs, assume the executive roles in nursing informatics, and provide support for nursing informatics as a clinical specialty.

A decision to hire more nursing informatics specialists and provide support for nursing informatics as a clinical specialty will enable informatics specialists to customize health information systems, participate in interdisciplinary teams, ensure data security, privacy, and confidentiality, and manage IT experts (Hübner et al., 2022). In the same vein, training nurses and other healthcare professionals on nursing informatics will promote team-based utilization of health technology, including secure messaging, real-time documentation of clinical processes, and appropriate timing of care services (Iuppa & Suresh, 2022). Finally, assuming executive roles in the incorporation of nursing informatics into clinical practice will enable the CNO and the human resource manager to provide the necessary leadership skills and knowledge relevant to promoting the assimilation of health information technology (HIT).

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References

Dykes, S., & Chu, C. H. (2020). Now more than ever, nurses need to be involved in technology design: lessons from the COVID‐19 pandemic. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 30(7-8). https://doi.org/10.1111/jocn.15581

Farokhzadian, J., Khajouei, R., Hasman, A., & Ahmadian, L. (2020). Nurses’ experiences and viewpoints about the benefits of adopting information technology in health care: A qualitative study in Iran. BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making, 20(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12911-020-01260-5

HübnerU., Wilson, G. M., Morawski, T. S., & Ball, M. J. (2022). Nursing informatics: A health informatics, interprofessional and global perspective (5th ed.). Springer.

Iuppa, N., & Suresh, S. (2022). Physician and nurse informatics collaboration boosts clinical practice, engagement, and overall digital experience (pp. 1–13). Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society. https://www.himss.org/sites/hde/files/media/file/2022/12/01/himss_nurseinfocollaboration_wp.pdf

McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K. G. (2018). Nursing informatics and the foundation of knowledge (4th ed.). Jones & Bartlett Learning.

Moore, W., & Frye, S. (2019). Review of HIPAA, part 1: History, protected health information, and privacy and security rules. Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology, 47(4), 269–272. https://doi.org/10.2967/jnmt.119.227819

Zadvinskis, I. M., Garvey Smith, J., & Yen, P.-Y. (2018). Nurses’ experience with health information technology: Longitudinal qualitative study. JMIR Medical Informatics, 6(2), e38. https://doi.org/10.2196/medinform.8734

Assessment 1 Instructions: Nursing Informatics in Health Care

Write a 4-5 page evidence-based proposal to support the need for a nurse informaticist in an organization who would focus on improving health care outcomes.

 

As you begin to prepare this assessment, you are encouraged to complete the Team Perspectives of the Nurse Informaticist activity. Completion of this will help you succeed with the assessment as you explore the nurse informaticist’s role from the different perspectives of the health care team. Completing activities is also a way to demonstrate engagement.

Nurses at the baccalaureate level in all practice areas are involved in nursing informatics through interaction with information management and patient care technologies. Nurses must not only demonstrate knowledge of and skills in health information and patient care technologies, but also how to use these tools at the bedside

and organizational levels. Moreover, nurses need to recognize how information gathered from various health information sources can impact decision making at the national and state regulatory levels.

 

For this assessment, assume you are a nurse attending a meeting of your state‘s nurses association. A nurse informaticist conducted a presentation on her role and its impact on positive patient and organizational outcomes in her workplace. You realize that your organization is undergoing many technological changes. You believe this type of role could provide many benefits to your organization.

You decide to pursue proposing a nurse informaticist role in your organization. You speak to your chief nursing officer (CNO) and human resources (HR) manager, who ask you to prepare a 4—5 page evidence-based proposal to support the new role. In this way, they can make an informed decision as to whether the addition of such a role could justify the return on investment (ROI). They need your proposal before an upcoming fiscal meeting.​ This is not an essay, but instead, it is a proposal to create a new Nurse lnformaticist position.

One important part of this assessment is the justification of the need for a nurse informaticist in a health care organization and references from relevant and timely scholarly or professional resources to support the justification for creating this nurse informaticist position. The term justify means to show or prove that the nurse informaticist position brings value to the organization. This justification must include evidence from the literature to support that this position will provide a return on investment for the organization.

To successfully prepare for this assessment, you will need to complete these preparatory activities:

 

• Review assessment resources and

 

o Conduct independent research on the nursing knowledge and skills necessary to interact with health

information and patient care technology.

« Focus your research on current resources available through peer-reviewed articles, professional websites, government websites, professional blogs, wikis, job boards, and so on.

• Consult the BSN Program Library Research Guide for help in identifying scholarly and authoritative
• Interview peers in your network who are considered information technology
  • Ask them about how information technology advances are impacting patient care at the bedside, at the organizational level, and beyond.

 

 

 

 

The chief nursing officer (CNO) and human resources (HR) manager have asked you to include the following

headings in your proposal and to be sure to address the bullets following each heading:

 

Nursing Informatics and the Nurse lnformaticist

• What is nursing informatics?
• What is the role of the nurse informaticist?

 

Nurse Informaticists and Other Health Care Organizations

• What is the experience of other health care organizations with nurse informaticists?

•    How do these nurse informaticists interact with the rest of the nursing staff and the interdisciplinary team?

IM PACT OF FULL NURSE ENGAGEMENT IN HEALTH CARE TECHNOLOGY

 

• How does fully engaging nurses in health care technology impact:

« Patient care?

• Protected health information (security, privacy, and confidentiality)?

o In this section, you will explain evidence-based strategies that the nurse informaticist and interdisciplinary team can use to effectively manage patients’ protected health information, particularly privacy, security, and confidentiality. Evidence-based means that they are supported by evidence from scholarly sources.

Workflow?

• Costs and return on investment?

 

Opportunities and Challenges

• What are the opportunities and challenges for nurses and the interdisciplinary team with the addition of a nurse informaticist role?

« How can the interdisciplinary team collaborate to improve quality care outcomes through

technology?

 

Summary of Recommendations

• What are 3—4 key takeaways from your proposal about the recommended nurse informaticist role that you want the CNO and the HR manager to remember?

o     This is the section where the justification for the implementation of the nursing informaticist role is

addressed. Remember to include evidence from the literature to support your recommendation.

 

Additional Requirements

• Written communication: Ensure written communication is free of errors that detract from the overall
• Submission length: 4—5 double-spaced pages, in addition to title and references

 

• Font: Times New Roman, 12
• Citations and References: Cite a minimum of three current scholarly and/or authoritative sources to support your In addition, cite a minimum of one current professional blog or website to support your central ideas. Current means no more than five years old.

•    APA formatting: Be sure to follow APA formatting and style guidelines for citations and references. For an APA refresher, consult the Evidence and APA page on Campus.

By successfully completing this assessment, you will demonstrate your proficiency in the following course competencies and scoring guide criteria:

•    Competency 1: Describe nurses’ and the interdisciplinary team’s role in informatics with a focus on electronic

health information and patient care technology to support decision making.

• Define nursing informatics and the role of the nurse
• Explain how the nurse collaborates with the interdisciplinary team, including technologists, to improve the quality of patient care.
• Justify the need for a nurse informaticist in a health care

• Competency 2: Implement evidence-based strategies to effectively manage protected health

o     Explain evidence-based strategies that the nurse and interdisciplinary team can use to effectively

manage patients’ protected health information (privacy, security, and confidentiality).

•    Competency 5: Apply professional, scholarly communication to facilitate use of health information and patient care technologies.

• Follow APA style and formatting guidelines for citations and
• Create a clear, well-organized, and professional proposal that is generally free from errors in grammar, punctuation, and spelling.

SCORING GUIDE

Use the scoring guide to understand how your assessment will be evaluated.