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MASSACHUSETTS NURSE NEWSLETTER ::
January 2008
New survey reveals nurses’ use of IT tools a Catch-22
RNs have little time to learn or use time-saving tools
Nurses continue to recognize numerous ways in which information
technology (IT) helps them care for patients but cite significant barriers
to IT adoption, according to a new study.
CDW Health Care, a leading provider of technology products and
services to health care organizations, recently announced the results of
“Nurses Talk Tech 2007,” a survey of more than 1,000 nursing professionals
from across the U.S.
“Studies continue to underscore that the nationwide shortage of
nurses is getting worse, not better,” said Bob Rossi, senior director for
CDW Health Care. Specifically, the U.S. faces a growing shortage of
nurses. In 2002, an estimated 30 states had nursing shortages, with a
20 percent national shortfall expected by 2020.
Related to this, medical errors continue to pose a serious threat to
patient care nationwide, with survey data finding an error rate as high
as 34 percent across hospital and ambulatory care facilities. In their
role as front-line clinicians, nurses need the right tools to aid them in
their drive to provide accurate, timely patient care.
“As the nursing crisis becomes more acute, health care organizations
will need to increase the effectiveness of front-line caregivers by
equipping them with right tools and technologies that can help them
in delivering the best patient care,” Rossi commented. “Unfortunately,
the situation has become so severe that many nursing staffs do not have
the time or resources needed to allocate to learning and implementing
the IT tools that have been proven in cases to improve speed, efficiency
and accuracy.”
The benefits
In the latest Nurses Talk Tech survey, nurses identify several benefits
of using IT in the clinical setting, with respondents reporting that
technology allows them faster, broader access to patient information;
improves workflow efficiency; increases communication and enhances
timely analysis of patient information. At the same time, principal
challenges include duplication between paper and IT processes, the
relative lack of nursing-specific IT tools and applications, as well as
inadequate training.
Technology continues to be a significant component of the nursing
environment, with 42 percent of respondents claiming they spend four
or more hours a day using IT. Although nurses report using a variety of
IT elements, the overwhelming majority rely on desktops (89 percent)
and laptops (21 percent); nine percent use handheld devices and only
three percent use tablet PCs. Nurses use technology to support a number
of administrative and clinical
functions—69 percent
of respondents claim they
use IT to manage e-mail, 60
percent document or chart
patient information in an electronic
medical record (EMR)
and 53 percent order patient
tests or prescriptions through
computerized physician order
entry systems.
The disadvantages
Despite nurses’ consistent use of
and support for IT in the clinical
setting, respondents cite a
significant lack of involvement
in the IT selection and implementation
process: 27 percent
of respondents report that
nurse managers play a role in
the selection of IT, while only
15 percent of staff nurses
are involved. In addition
to relatively low levels of
nursing involvement, only
25 percent of respondents report their organizations employ a nursing
informaticist position—a 14 percent drop from 2006. Organizations
containing informaticist positions enjoy a number of advantages over
those which do not, including a higher rate of paperless/filmless process
implementation (75 percent versus 55 percent), the establishment of near
or total access control for patient records (53 percent versus 41 percent)
and the ability to e-prescribe (34 percent versus 20 percent).
The survey found mixed progress on electronic data initiatives, with
44 percent of respondents claiming their health care organizations do
not have the ability to electronically access health records from other
providers and 50 percent reporting that their employers are unable to
e-prescribe. However, survey participants say that more than one-half
of their health care organizations have initiated a transition to paperless
or filmless processes.
In general, nurses positively rate their organization’s efforts to ensure
patient data security, with 41 percent stating that their employer has
established total or near total access control for patient records and
52 percent claiming that their organization has adopted some level of
security protocol. A notable exception occurs among long-term care
facilities, where 22 percent of nurses report their employer devotes little
to no effort to ensuring patient data security.
More information on this CDW Health Care survey is online at www.
cdw.com/health care.
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