Discussion: Health Care Assessment
Discussion: Health Care Assessment
Question Description
Write a 4-5 page evidence-based proposal to support the need for a nurse informaticist in a health care organization focused on improving health care outcomes. You are encouraged to complete the Team Perspectives of the Nurse Informaticist activity as you begin to prepare for this assessment. Completing this will help you succeed with the assessment as you investigate the role of the nurse informaticist from the various perspectives of the health care team. Completing activities is another way to show engagement. Nurses at the baccalaureate level are involved in nursing informatics through interaction with information management and patient care technologies in all practice areas. Nurses must demonstrate not only knowledge and skills in health information and patient care technologies, but also how to use these tools at the bedside and at the organizational level. Furthermore, nurses must understand how information gathered from various health information sources can influence regulatory decision making at the national and state levels. PROFICIENCY DEMONSTRATION
You will demonstrate your proficiency in the course competencies by successfully completing this assessment using the following assessment scoring guide criteria:
Competency 1: Describe the role of nurses and the interdisciplinary team in informatics, with a focus on electronic health information and patient care technology to aid decision making.
Define nursing informatics and the nurse informaticist’s role.
Explain how the nurse works with the interdisciplinary team, including technologists, to improve patient care quality.
Explain why a health care organization requires a nurse informaticist.
Competency 2: Use evidence-based strategies to manage protected health information effectively.
Explain how the nurse and interdisciplinary team can use evidence-based strategies to effectively manage patients’ protected health information (privacy, security, and confidentiality).
Competency 5: Use professional, scholarly communication to make health information and patient care technologies easier to use.
Citations and references should be formatted in accordance with APA guidelines.
Create a clear, well-organized, and professional proposal that is free of grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors.
SCENARIO
Assume you are a nurse attending a meeting of your state’s nurses’ association for this assessment. In her workplace, a nurse informaticist gave a presentation about her role and its impact on positive patient and organizational outcomes. You notice that your company is undergoing numerous technological changes. You believe that this type of role would be beneficial to your organization. You decide to pursue a nurse informaticist position in your organization. You consult with your chief nursing officer (CNO) and human resources manager (HR). These people want you to write a 4-5 page evidence-based proposal to support the new position. As a result, they can make an informed decision about whether adding such a role is worth the return on investment (ROI). They require your proposal prior to the upcoming fiscal meeting. PREPARATION
To successfully prepare for this assessment, you must complete the following activities:
Examine your assessment resources and activities.
Conduct your own research into the nursing knowledge and skills required to interact with health information and patient care technology.
Concentrate your search on current resources, such as peer-reviewed articles, professional websites, government websites, professional blogs, wiki pages, job boards, and so on.
For assistance in identifying scholarly and authoritative sources, consult the BSN Program Library Research Guide.
Interview peers in your network who are considered experts in information technology.
Inquire about how advances in information technology are affecting patient care at the bedside, at the organizational level, and beyond.
The Chief Nursing Officer (CNO) and Human Resources (HR) manager have requested that you include the following headings in your proposal and address the bullets beneath each heading:
The Nurse Informaticist and Nursing Informatics
What exactly is nursing informatics?
What is the nurse informaticist’s role?
Other Health Care Organizations and Nurse Informaticists
What has other health care organizations’ experience with nurse informaticists been like?
What are their interactions with the rest of the nursing staff and the interdisciplinary team?
The Effects of Complete Nurse Engagement in Health Care Technology
What effect does fully involving nurses in health care technology have on:Patient care?
Health information safeguarded (security, privacy, and confidentiality)?
Workflow?
What are the costs and the return on investment?
Opportunities and Difficulties
What are the opportunities and challenges for nurses and the interdisciplinary team now that a nurse informaticist role has been added?
How can the interdisciplinary team use technology to improve quality care outcomes?
Recommendations Summary
What are the three or four most important takeaways from your proposal about the recommended nurse informaticist role that you want the CNO and HR manager to remember?
Additional Conditions
Written communication: Make certain that written communication is error-free and does not detract from the overall message.
Submission length: 4-5 double-spaced pages, plus a title and references page.
12 point Times New Roman font
References and Citations: Cite at least three current scholarly and/or authoritative sources to back up your claims. In addition, cite at least one current professional blog or website to back up your main points. Current means within the last five years.
Formatting in APA style: For citations and references, make sure to follow the APA formatting and style guidelines. Consult the APA Style and Format page on Campus for an APA refresher.
Prompt for Portfolio: You should save your presentation to your ePortfolio. Your ePortfolio submissions will be included in your final capstone course.
Identifying a Local Health Care Economic Issue
Health outcomes, at the organizational and national levels, depend on the practicality and productivity of health interventions. Central in health care economics is the efficiency of health interventions since it affects the overall nation’s health spending. In the past decade, health care spending has surged to $4.3 trillion in 2021 (CMS.gov, 2022). As a result, governments and stakeholders in the health industry should be aware of the issues hampering cost-effectiveness locally and nationally. The purpose of this paper is to identify a local health care economic issue, rationale, influence, and the gap contributing to the need to address it.
The Issue and Impacts on a Specific Population
Patients require adequate attention to receive comprehensive care. Unfortunately, inadequate staffing characterized by a nursing shortage is an issue of massive concern at all levels. Inadequate staffing implies a higher patient volume than the available workforce (Gaines, 2022). Impacts vary across populations. According to Waldrop and Gee (2022), the rural population is significantly affected by inadequate staffing, considering that rural settings account for two-thirds of the professional workforce shortage in primary care. Such a shortage expands the health gap between rural and urban populations and increases the health burden in rural areas.
Rationale for Choosing the Health Care Economics Issue
Inadequate staffing is a significant health economic issue that predicts health care management challenges if not adequately addressed. As Waldrop and Gee (2022) observed, the current U.S. health care system requires an additional 14,858 health care professionals to address the shortage across the country. The massive shortage implies a similar gap between the achieved and desirable health outcomes. Considering that rural people are significantly affected by this shortage, the problem of health disparities will persist as the shortage intensifies.
Impact on Work, Organization, Colleagues, and Community
Employee shortage significantly affects the nursing staff, workplaces, and communities. At a personal level, inadequate staffing increases the daily workload and is a leading cause of job dissatisfaction. Over time, it limits overall productivity. In the organization, inadequate staffing increases spending due to temporary staff hiring and implementing programs to help nurses overcome the detrimental effects of a workforce shortage. For instance, self-care programs to help nurses cope with burnout increase organizational expenses. To my colleagues, inadequate staffing causes nurse burnout, characterized by fatigue and emotional exhaustion (Shah et al., 2021). Its persistence reduces the work efficacy of nurses. At the community level, inadequate staffing hampers health care providers’ ability to address health inequities. The illness burden increases since patients do not get timely and sufficient care.
Gap Contributing to the Need to Address the Issue
Nurse turnover is the main gap that necessitates a prompt and practical response to inadequate staffing. It is a significant gap since nurse turnover, and staffing shortage have a bi-directional relationship. In this case, each influences the other. Marć et al. (2019) found that increasing rates of chronic illnesses due to aging are a leading cause of the nursing shortage. Failure to address this shortage will increase the overall illness burdens among individuals, health care organizations, and communities. Health care organizations will be overwhelmed, and their ability to provide competent care will dwindle over time.
Conclusion
Health care organizations should design cost-effective interventions to save costs and enhance efficiency. However, this critical goal can only be achieved if issues that increase health care spending are adequately addressed. Inadequate staffing is a significant health care economics issue that affects outcomes at all levels. Nurse turnover and an increase in chronic health conditions are the leading causes. Rural populations are unfairly affected by inadequate staffing due to the shortage of primary care providers in rural areas.
References
CMS.gov. (2022). Historical. https://www.cms.gov/research-statistics-data-and-systems/statistics-trends-and-reports/nationalhealthexpenddata/nationalhealthaccountshistorical#:~:text=U.S.%20health%20care%20spending%20grew,For%20additional%20information%2C%20see%20below.
Gaines, K. (2022). What’s really behind the nursing shortage? 1,500 nurses share their stories. nurse.org. https://nurse.org/articles/nursing-shortage-study/
Marć, M., Bartosiewicz, A., Burzyńska, J., Chmiel, Z., & Januszewicz, P. (2019). A nursing shortage–a prospect of global and local policies. International Nursing Review, 66(1), 9-16. https://doi.org/10.1111/inr.12473
Shah, M. K., Gandrakota, N., Cimiotti, J. P., Ghose, N., Moore, M., & Ali, M. K. (2021). Prevalence of and factors associated with nurse burnout in the US. JAMA Network Open, 4(2), e2036469-e2036469. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.36469
Waldrop, T., & Gee, E. (2022). How states can expand health care access in rural communities. CAP. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/how-states-can-expand-health-care-access-in-rural-communities/