Interactions between Nurse Informatics and other Specialists - Free Paper

Nursing informatics is a specialty that integrates the use of sciences in nursing, information, and computers to help to manage information knowledge, wisdom, and communication within nursing practices. This concept was introduced to the healthcare sector in the 1950s. It evolved with computers in the early 1970s, clearing the way for information technology to be adopted by healthcare practitioners. As Information technology started transforming different departments in healthcare organizations, the industry realized a need to create a bridge in the gap between IT personnel and clinicians’ communication so that they could efficiently deal with patient care issues leading to the formation of the nursing informatics specialty.

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Nursing informatics supports patients’ decision-making, other health providers, and nurses in all settings and roles. Nurse informatics interacts with healthcare organizations' management by contributing to the decision-making process and discussing the best medical information technology to be adopted for better delivery of patient care (Nagle et al., 2017). Many nurse informatics educate nurses on the best way to effectively enter crucial medical information into computer systems. They also interact with other nurses by training them on how to use technology, whether it is a common technology in the healthcare organization or a new one, which helps increase the accuracy and efficiency of nursing processes.

Nurse informatics also interacts with healthcare supervisors by enabling them to track workflow, staff, and communication which makes it easy to identify various areas where specific processes can be improved. These nurses also relay information from the pharmacists, therapists, billing, and physicians during care and when patients are being discharged. Nurse informatics also interacts with physicians, making them aware of different strategies to manage diseases and increase coordination with healthcare professionals. It empowers various medical groups through upgrading and enhancing their knowledge and helping them decrease the chances of medical errors in departments that deal with emergencies.

One primary strategy to improve these interactions is through the provision of simultaneous education access that allows all staff in the healthcare organization to get a broad knowledge of accessible software and new technologies. Another strategy is adopting educational programs that will help all professionals take advantage of IT in health care quality and nursing outcomes (Darvish et al., 2014). These programs will strengthen nurses at various levels of the healthcare sector and implement IT tools in all other specialists' professional aspects. Nursing informatics should also align nursing best practices with workflows and care in the clinic, improve the protocols and procedures for collecting and reporting data, train other specialists, and test new medical devices with other specialists before use in the organization to improve these interactions.

Without critical information, patients suffer because they do not receive adequate care. Informatics improves the coordination of data from all professionals in the healthcare sector; hence, nurses can offer all the required information to patients. Accurate relaying of this information leads to an improvement in care satisfaction and outcomes (Rupp, 2016). Nursing informatics is slowly changing the face of healthcare organizations due to the advancement of technologies that have enabled health providers to collect, leverage, and analyze data more effectively to influence how care is delivered. Nursing informatics has more technology that they can use at their disposal than any other nurses before them, and this has played a significant role in improving patient care(Rupp, 2016). Nurses who are considered informatics experts have various attributes such as applying technology, a desire to learn, positive communication skills and attitudes, and an ability to manage and store resources and data.

Conclusion

Nursing informatics focuses most on the best way to achieve excellent patient outcomes; hence it applies best practices to maximize patient care. Nurse informatics interacts with other healthcare specialists by getting involved in clinical workflow reviews, process designs, treatment plans, and diagnostics. Nursing informatics and the emergence of new technologies in the healthcare sector have played a significant role in reducing medical costs and errors, enhancing continued care and end-to-end treatment, and driving efficiency in patient outcomes.

References

Darvish, A., Bahramnezhad, F., Keyhanian, S., & Navidhamidi, M. (2014).The role of nursing informatics on promoting quality of health care and the need for appropriate education. Global Journal of Health Science, 6(6), 11. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4825491/pdf/GJHS-6-11.pdf

Nagle, L. M., Sermeus, W., Junger, A., & Bloomberg, L. S. (2017). Evolving role of the nursing informatics specialist. Forecasting Informatics Competencies for Nurses in the Future of Connected Health, 212. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/b95f/87fb95d46006773ef54d4e148baa16e1e965.pdf

Rupp, S. (2016). How nurses are using health informatics to improve patient care. Electronic Health Reporter. https://electronichealthreporter.com/nurses-using-health-informatics-improve-patient-care/.