Information and Integration
WEEK 2 DISCUSSION 1
Information and Integration
As the use of informatics continues to increase in nursing practice, it is important for nurses to understand how to use these types of technologies. Nurses must be able to utilize the many functions of these tools, along with inputting and deciphering data. Reflect on your own experience using information technology, and then address the following:
• As a practicing RN, how would you describe your level of information literacy? Explain your reasoning, including one example.
• How important is information literacy to your practice? Why?
Support your ideas or those of others with references from the professional nursing literature.
Post your response by Day 3 of this week. Cite the references used in APA style format.
Information Systems
Name:
Institution:
In every environment where more than one person interacts with one another regardless of whether it is professional or personal, communication is the backbone. Aspects of communications are so subtle that they affect entire organizations with close reference to the short-term goals and the long-term goals (Lee, 2007). In the nursing practice, communication is key to the implementation of the various interventions that patient require. This also implies that the nurses have to exchange information on every stage of the health care delivery (Skiba & Rizzolo, 2009).
At the current work place, communication protocol is somehow obscure and at times it gets in the way of quality services delivery. This is further complicated by the fact that the hospital has not had a chance to invest in technology as much. This means that most of the personnel have to rely on the charting records (Lee, 2007). Given that it is a large community hospital it receives quite a number of patients that do not have insurance. Due to the manual system, sometimes emergencies can be complicated as it takes time to get to the records and identify any medical history where it exists. Most of the records are shared and this makes the data retrieval quit cumbersome and increases the rate of inefficiency in health care delivery (Killeen & King, 2007). It also compromises the safety and the satisfaction of the patients, not forgetting that of the staff. In the past, there have been medical errors that have been quit fatal and all of them have been attributed to the poor information sharing platforms. This prompted the use of integrated information systems, which have been underway for the better part of the last two years. At the moment, the system is not fully functional and the thus staff cannot fully embrace the benefits associated.
Having the integrated and/or interoperable computer-based information system operational will have subtle benefits to the patients and the staffs. One of the major ways that the system will r...