NSEU Electronic Health Records and Nursing Practice Discussion Reply

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Electronic Health Records and Nursing Practice

Healthcare Information Technology (HIT) is transforming the operation of the healthcare industry and has already started to minimize waste and aid advance health outcomes. Electronic health records (EHRs) are types of patient records which patient information such as a patient’s medical history, test results, treatment plan, and personal contact information (Harrington, 2017). Some advantages of EHRs include advancing positive patient results, population health, and increasing efficiency. Likely improvements in population health and health promotion include EHRs’ capability to consolidate and analyze huge amounts of patient information. According to Akhu?Zaheya et al.,(2018), EHRs could enable increased utilization of health services, better adherence to treatment, and involvement in health decisions. Additionally, another major contribution of EHRs to health promotion is the rapid dissemination of information. Besides, in the present vibrant health structures, technology plays a significant role in shaping nurse practice and education.

An advanced practice nurse can utilize EHRs to create predictive models which have the capability of generating real-time interpretations from a large patient population to predict patients’ hospital and create alerts. Nurse leaders are at the forefront in ensuring organizational strategies for recognizing risks and harms via patient assessment, surveillance activities, patient monitoring, and planning for care are attained. The use of EHR ensures accurate documentation, therefore, minimizing delays and longer hospital stays due to erroneous information (del Carmen Ortega-Navas, 2017).EHRs also complement other technological advancements such as telehealth or telenursing. Consequently, advanced practice nurses may develop easy remote diagnostic programs to enable E-health services which can significantly improve patient outcomes, especially in rural settings. Besides, advanced practice nurses may also utilize family

histories stored in EHRs to examine disease risk and provide insight into the relationship between inherited and social aspects related to patient care.

References

Akhu?Zaheya, L., Al?Maaitah, R., & Bany Hani, S. (2018). Quality of nursing documentation: Paper?based health records versus electronic?based health records. Journal of clinical nursing, 27(3-4), e578-e589.

del Carmen Ortega-Navas, M. (2017). The use of new technologies as a tool for the promotion of health education. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 237, 23-29.

Harrington, L. (2017). New health technologies advancing nursing practice. AACN advanced critical care, 28(4), 311-313.