Regarding Joanna’s case, it is essential to evaluate her care requirements to see how ICT helps meet such needs. Joanna is a nursing student currently on her clinical placement in a busy hospital. She is responsible for caring for the patients and reporting to the hospital management about their needs. Thus, Joanna needs to find a reasonable compromise between the requirements of her workload and keep proper documentation on time. In this instance, ICT is necessary because it enables Joanna to fulfill her documentation and communication needs.
Telehealth technology can be used to meet Joanna’s needs. The term telehealth is used to describe the process of video conferencing between a patient and a healthcare professional. The telehealth app will enable Joanna to communicate with her patients virtually, thus limiting contact (Zonneveld et al., 2020). This will be particularly relevant during a pandemic or isolation when Joanna cannot see her patients in person. Joanna can also join interdisciplinary discussions and consultations with other staff members through remote collaboration using telehealth technology.
Another ICT tool that can address Joanna’s documentation needs is a health mobile application tailored for this purpose. Medical professionals use health mobile apps to store and retrieve patient information. Joanna can download these applications on her mobile phone or tablet and use them to deal with the problems of care among patients even when she is not at home. The most appropriate use of this mobile app is in the hospital, where Joanna has to find a computer or workstation immediately.
In addition, ICT implementation through EHRs can also meet Joanna’s documentation needs. EHR is an electronic recording system through which healthcare providers document the treatment given to patients sequentially (Zonneveld et al., 2019). EHRs will enable Joanna to monitor her activities in real time because the technology guarantees accurate and timely information generation. This will allow her to reduce the risks associated with such errors or omissions typical of traditional documentation.
As registered nurses, we can take steps towards implementing health information technology in documentation and communication. For instance, nurses can lobby for adopting and using EHRs in the healthcare industry. This involves informing co-workers and management of the benefits of EHRs by saying that if everyone uses them, that person will have better documentation and communication (Zonneveld et al., 2020). RNs may also participate in constructing and personalizing EHR systems to address nursing-specific requirements.
RNs can also teach their junior nursing partners to use ICT. This may also include holding training, developing user guides and protocols, and providing continuous mentorship (Zonneveld et al., 2020). The use of technology by RNs makes the implementation and transition process easy and provides better documentation and communication across the whole healthcare structure.
In a nutshell, information and communication technology is an excellent antidote to the issues associated with documentation and communications, as Joanna experienced. With the help of EHRs and telehealth technology, Joanna can minimize documentation costs and improve accuracy. As RNs, we should endorse implementing these technologies and learn to use them to persuade our employees to use technology. When RNs engage in such activities, they can help promote documentation and communication processes within healthcare facilities, thus enabling better patient care.
References
Zonneveld, M., Patomella, A. H., Asaba, E., & Guidetti, S. (2020). The use of information and communication technology in healthcare to improve participation in everyday life: a scoping review. Disability and Rehabilitation, 42(23), 3416–3423.
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