Paper
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Supporting Nursing's Contribution to eHealth to Maximize Quality Patient Care and Outcomes
Irmajean Bajnok, RN, MSN, PhD, Centre for Professional Nursing Excellence, Registered Nurses' Associaiton of Ontario, Toronto, ON, Canada and Lynn M. Nagle, RN, PhD, Nagle & Associates Inc, Toronto, ON, Canada.
| Learning Objective #1: To provide participants with a framework to support nursing’s involvement in ehealth to maximize quality patient care.
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| Learning Objective #2: To outline the early outcomes of various communication and education strategies to facilitate nurses’ involvement in ehealth as it relates to quality patient care. |
Nursing is challenged to utilize evidence in clinical decisions and master a multitude of technology enhanced processes. Therefore, it is critical that nurses be involved in the strategic planning, design, development, implementation and evaluation of health care informatics applications. eHealth systems and applications must respond to the requirements and needs of nursing as they relate to quality care in order to be embraced by nurses.
The Registered Nurses Association of Ontario (RNAO), with funding from the Ontario, Canada Ministry of Health and Long Term Care, has embarked on a project to provide nurses with the knowledge, skills and confidence to contribute to ehealth and informatics policy making and become fully involved in using informatics applications in their practice. This project has resulted in identification of a framework incorporating knowledge, visibility, synergy and accessibility; a beginning profile of views and competencies of nurses related to informatics; and an action plan focused on education, communication, engaging nursing leadership, and championing effective informatics applications. In addition a cross-sector informatics survey of nurses in education, administration, practice, research and policy addressing the areas of awareness, use, comfort, ability to influence other health disciplines, and challenges will be implemented.
This presentation will provide a brief overview of the elements of the survey and action plan including examples of specific communication and education strategies. The presentation will conclude with action plan outcomes related to the survey results and how this information will be used; early impacts of the basic ehealth education program for nurses; and results of the communication strategies targeted at nurses in all sectors and in clinical, education, and senior administrative leadership roles.