How many of you rely on a calculator today for nursing practice? 

I remember my calculator was a necessity for me each time I was preparing a pediatric medication during my years in direct care. I took care of hospitalized children and each medication was weight based dosing. The calculator, in partnership with my Lexi Comp pediatric dosing guide, were essentials for me. I could not function without those items. I also needed my stethoscope and pen to be an effective nurse. 

While I began my RN journey in 2000, just a decade earlier there were articles published that were investigating whether nurses should be using calculators or not in practice. One article entitled, "Should Nurses Carry Calculators?" (from conference proceedings in 1998), investigated the role of calculators for nursing care delivery. 

The abstract starts with these two sentences, "It has been a widespread tradition of nurse education establishments to forbid the use of hand-held...

Technology in healthcare is here to stay. I have spoken to hundreds, maybe thousands now, of nurses and healthcare professionals across the globe about healthcare, nursing, technology and more. 

A common concern I hear and can see is the concern of technology's role in healthcare. "It is not nursing", is something I have heard through the years. "It gets in the way of working with patients" or "Patients think I am not working when I am on a device". Other common concerns are related to documentation burden, accessibility of information, and difficulties with using aspects of the technology. 

Now, with the emergence and attention of artificial intelligence (AI) tools for use in healthcare and the overarching concern of the potential for bias, inaccuracies, lack of transparency and a general need to understand how the technology works, the concern is greater. 

So, how do we as a profession become ready, forward thinking, and proactive in preparation for new AI...

Hello All! 

I hope you all have had a restful and enjoyable holiday weekend. The 4th of July weekend brings many memories for me over the years. In the last few years, I have come to really enjoy the month of July. 

July also marks the start of the second half of the year. 

Something that I have seen continue to be a focal discussion point over the last six months has been the potential and/or anticipated use of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare. 

Artificial Intelligence is already here. You may likely be using it in your daily life and not even realize it. In this week's iCare about Health Tech podcast, Episode 10: Artificial Intelligence or Augmented Intelligence?, I reference the popular driving app, Waze.  

In the episode I provide some examples as to how the insights that app provides while driving influences my decision making abilities more effectively than if I did not have access to that app. 

I am still the driver but I have an...

Happy June all!

Over the last few weeks, I have noticed an increase in questions and curiosity around the use of technology in nursing and healthcare. 

Twenty years ago, we were largely on paper and technology was perceived to some extent as a foreign entity that was not necessarily "part" of nursing. We had operated on paper to document, to manage medications, to check orders and more. 

However, today in 2024, the vast majority of health centers, systems, practices, and organizations are using digital tools for patient record management, medication management, labs, radiology and more. 

One can no longer separate nursing and healthcare from the dependency on technology. 

However, I would like to have you reflect on the stethoscope for a moment. Would you consider that to be a technology? 

The stethoscope was invented to standardize the assessment of patient heart, lung and bowel sounds across healthcare professionals. Prior to its invention, one relied...

Cheers to May 12th!

Today, May 12th, is recognized as Nursing Informatics Day by the American Nurses Association (ANA). Consider how special it is that Informatics Nursing gets a day of recognition during nurses week. For a specialty that was officially recognized in 1992, informatics continually makes an impact across the profession and beyond. Nursing Informatics Day was officially recognized in 2008, 16 years ago.

May 12th is also recognized as International Nurses Day recognized by the International Council of Nurses. May 12th marks the last day of National Nurses Week. The significance of the day is that it is Florence Nightingale's date of birth. 

Florence Nightingale was a visionary of nursing in many ways, including the specialty practice of informatics. 

Over the last week, I had several conversations about nursing, informatics, the future, the past, and how to integrate it all together in a meaningful way. This can seem overwhelming at times. 

However, it is...

Today is May 6th and it marks the start of another year of National Nurses Week in the United States!

As I thought about Nurses Week, I wondered, what is the history of this week for our profession? 

As a nurse of now 24 years, I have always had National Nurses Week. However, it was not long before that where there was not such a celebratory week recognizing the efforts and talents of the nurses across the country. 

According to the American Nurses Association's history of Nurses Week, it was in 1993 when the ANA Board of Directors designated May 6th - May 12th as National Nurses Week for 1994 and beyond! 

Thus, 2024 would mark 30 years of continued celebrations. 

As nurses who have an interest, curiosity, or are currently working in health information technology and/or informatics, you may also be interested to know that the first board certification exam for informatics nursing was offered right around that time in 1995 (and recognized as a specialty practice...

Nursing is the science of caring. When I first had the interest to be a nurse, my interest was in helping other people. The use of technological solutions was not a core focus for me to pursue my nursing education and preparation. 

When electronic health records (EHRs) began to enter into the nursing care practice, we as nurses started to see a shift in how visible technology was in care delivery. Charting went from paper based records to electronic based records. 

However, technology has always been a part of care delivery. 

Consider the stethoscope. Is that a technology? 

What about the blood pressure cuff or the oxygen saturation monitor? 

Technology has always been a part of nursing care delivery. However, how we use technology and to what extent has increased tremendously over the last two decades. 

To help support the integration of technology into nursing care, we have nurses who specialize in the use of technology. The nursing...

Happy Spring Ahead Sunday!

This morning I woke up to the sun out and that was refreshing! The last several weeks have been so cold and dreary that the brightness shining through the window made for an already pleasant start to the day. After a brief walk this morning I was not ready to jump into anything yet. I decided to watch a video seminar that had been recommended to me on the topic of Compassionate Technology. 

I was intrigued by the combination of the term compassionate within technology. Compassionate Care is a common term in nursing and healthcare. Anyone involved in the human aspect of healthcare has to have a compassionate side to his/her/their self. However this was a first for me to see the word compassionate paired within technology. Technology tends to have a rigid, forceful, direct, and binary connotation when first introduced. 

Putting those two terms together caught my attention in the context of nursing and healthcare delivery. As nurses and healthcare...

I was on a phone call last week discussing nursing, nursing informatics, and healthcare overall. During the conversation, I started to chuckle a bit and say that I do not get overly excited about spending hours each day sending and responding to emails. (I imagine that many of you can relate to this as well). However, I rarely look at emails as the goal. 

Instead, my mind is focused on the purpose of the email(s) and who I am connecting with or being connected to in an effort to help advance the work toward that collective goal. If email, phone calls, video calls, or other mechanisms help to reach that, then so be it. 

When projects get busy and time gets tight with timelines and milestones, our ability to think beyond the current moment gets a bit more challenging in the day to day. Yet, consider all of the people who you are helping through your diligent efforts and dedication to the details that working in nursing, health IT and informatics requires of...

Certified Nurses Day is coming soon on March 19th, less than 1 month away!

Perhaps you are board certified in nursing informatics or another certification in nursing. There are 12 specialty certifications in nursing with informatics nursing being one of those 12 available through the American Nurses Credentialing Center  (ANCC). 

Informatics nursing has been a specialty certification since 1995, nearly 30 years now. Nursing informatics was initially recognized as a specialty nursing practice in 1992 after decades of pioneering by nurses. 

In the 1990's the use of digital health tools were quite limited in nursing care delivery. Yet, there was a strong vision for the future for what was to come. 

Today, we are living in the digital age with continual need for improvements and refinement to address the data, information, knowledge, and wisdom needs of nurses, doctors, patients, families and the entire health care team. 

As we look toward the future the...