Clinical practice
The field of nursing is increasingly becoming a high tech profession. With the advancement in information technology, healthcare organizations and healthcare providers can collect and analyze health data effectively, which influences how care is delivered. One of the major areas where nurses are using technology is in the informatics. Nursing informatics involves the use of computers and information sciences to develop and maintain health data, and systems that support nursing practice to improve the outcome of health care. When nurses embrace healthcare informatics and technology, they are able to understand their strengths and weaknesses, which help them to make clinical decisions, advance their healthcare practice and increase patient safety. Nursing informatics can be applied to areas of professional nursing practice, which include clinical practice, administration, education and research.
Clinical practice
Nursing informatics has been applied in clinical practice through recording of patient assessment data in the electronic health records. Documentation is considered as one of the most important aspects of the nursing field in the delivery of quality care. Electronic documentation is having the greatest influence on modern clinical nursing. Through electronic documentation of patient’s conditions, and sharing the information electronically, nurses are able to manage and improve patient outcome (Sipes, 2019). Examples of clinical practice where nursing informatics can be applied is the electronic health records that collect patient information in real-time, transmit it, and can be retrieved when it is needed for medical purposes.
Administration
Nursing informatics is used in the administration to interpret information and modify the collected data to enhance nursing decisions. Administrators use nursing informatics in the analysis of medical information reports that are generated from the spreadsheet software application and review outcome indicators though the design software applications. Administration programs in informatics are used to facilitate their functions such as preparation of payroll, streamlining material control and finance management (Sipes, 2019). An example of how nursing informatics is used in administration is in the communication of patient data to the patient and family to promote and protect the patient’s health. Nursing administrators use informatics to send and receive health information and update health records of the patients such as immunizations and prescriptions. Don't use plagiarised sources.Get your custom essay just from $11/page
Nursing Education
Methods of nursing informatics used in nursing education include those applied in training and in the profession. Some nursing informatics methods used include e-learning or online education, virtual nursing classrooms, use of podcasts, e-health, and PDA for clinical experiences simulations. Informatics in nursing education ranges from teaching the end-user of nursing devices to teaching the next generation of nurses on how to use nursing technology in improving patient care outcome (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2015).
Nursing research
Nursing informatics can be used in nursing research in the evaluation of nursing-sensitive outcome measures and developing intervention measures in care delivery. Informatics in nursing requires scientific-based research, in which different research methods are applied. Nursing research requires informatics in structuring and processing information that aids in clinical practice decisions (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2015). Methodologies from biomedicine, computer science and information science are applied in nursing research. Research aspects in informatics provide standards for nursing evidence-based practice and bring new knowledge into nursing from the findings.
The most significant application of nursing informatics is in clinical practice. Through the use of electronic health records data in the clinical practice, it is usually easier for health providers to access patient information anytime it is required. Informatics enhances nursing decisions and quality care delivery by providing alerts to health care providers when something critical has happened during care delivery. It is possible to eliminate errors during patient care, and notifies nurses on the potential problems, and how she issues can be fixed to give better care to patients.