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Due to the advance of mobile technology, use of mobile devices such as smartphones has been growing rapidly in the U.S. and worldwide. Many health related mobile apps have been developed for care professionals and patients as well. However, studies indicate that there is a gap between science and commercially developed mobile apps. In addition to this, there is no framework to guide devlopment of a mobile app to overcome many challenges and obstacles. Through the development of a pain management mobile app for cancer patients, a framework was developed. A proposed framework was based on the technology acceptance model, ensuring usefulness and ease of use for end users. The first two steps in the framework enforce accurate knowledge translation and communication to build a science based mobile app. Iterative decisions points between steps enhance accomplishment of each step. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To enhance patient safety from falls, many hospital information systems have been implemented to collect clinical data from the bedside and have used the information to improve fall prevention care. However, most of them use administrative data not clinical nursing data. This necessitated the development of a web-based Nursing Practice and Research Information Management System (NPRIMS) that processes clinical nursing data to measure nurses' delivery of fall prevention care and its impact on patient outcomes. This pilot study developed computer algorithms based on a falls prevention protocol and programmed the prototype NPRIMS. It successfully measured the performance of nursing care delivered and its impact on patient outcomes using clinical nursing data from the study site. Results of the study revealed that NPRIMS has the potential to pinpoint components of nursing processes that are in need of improvement for preventing patient from falls. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Representing nursing assessment data in a reusable manner is important as it provides a basis for decision making in patient care. In a previous study, we have extended the ICNP concept model to support representation of nursing assessment data. In this study, we evaluated its potential to support electronic documentation of nursing assessment data and HL7 conformant message generation by mapping it to the HL7 RIM. The semantics represented by the ICNP were completely related to the RIM implying that the ICNP is a good candidate terminology to encode the data with in an electronic documentation system. A few differences between the two models in representing the same semantics suggests that there is value to supporting broad ranges of semantic relations in the ICNP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) are common tools for clinicians in daily practice. In order to use CPGs effectively at the point of care, representing CPGs into computer-interpretable format is essential. Since computer-interpretable guidelines (CIGs) have been reported to increase clinicians' usage of guidelines and improve patient's outcomes, it is critical to validate health care knowledge translated from CPGs into CIGs. A comprehensive method of developing and evaluating a gold standard for a depression screening CIG was performed and analyzed in this study. GLIF encoding was conducted for a depression screening CPG and 21 clinical scenarios were created based on the encoded depression screening CIG. Two nurse practitioners were recruited to generate initial management for each scenario. Proficiency and efficiency scores were calculated for each scenario. In 13 of 21 scenarios, both experts had proficiency scores of 100%. Proficiency scores were lowest for scenarios that included bipolar disease. Implications of our findings for development of a gold standard are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The number of health sciences educational programs that are integrating personal digital assistants (PDAs) into their curricula is on the rise. In this paper, we report an evaluation of the usefulness of a PDA-based advanced practice nursing (APN) student clinical log through faculty stakeholder exemplars in three areas: pediatric asthma care; procedures of Acute Care Nurse Practitioner (NP) students; and diagnostic and screening procedures of Women's Health NP students. We generated descriptive data through routine queries and through custom SQL queries at the request of a specific faculty member who wished to examine a particular aspect of an educational program. In addition, we discussed the potential implications of the data with the respective faculty members. The exemplars provide evidence that faculty stakeholders found the APN student clinical log to be useful for a variety of purposes including monitoring of student performance, benchmarking, and quality of care assessments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Computer-interpretable guidelines (CIGs) have been reported to increase clinicians' usage of guidelines and to improve patient outcomes. The Guideline Interchange Format (GLIF) represents a guideline as a flowchart of clinical decision and action steps. We encoded a depression screening guideline using GLIF to transform it into a CIG. After identifying all guideline steps from the text format guideline, a flowchart was drawn using the encoded steps in GLIF. The flowchart was validated by an experienced psychiatric nurse clinician. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increased demand of genetic counseling services heightened the necessity of a computerized genetic counseling decision support system. In order to develop an effective and efficient computerized system, modeling of genetic counseling guideline is an essential step. Throughout this pilot study, Agile methodology with United Modeling Language (UML) was utilized to model a guideline. 13 tasks and 14 associated elements were extracted. Successfully constructed conceptual class and activity diagrams revealed that Agile methodology with UML was a suitable tool to modeling a genetic counseling guideline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ineffective discharge processes often break the continuum of care, adversely affecting patients' outcome. In order to overcome such challenges and provide continuity of care to patients, an effective and smooth discharge process is important. A discharge information system that automatically processes data elements entered for discharge information is essential. In this preliminary study, a discharge information model was partially developed and encoded using UML, in order to form the foundation of an automated system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobile Decision Support for Advanced Practice Nurses (MODS-APN) is a PDA-based decision support tool designed to assist APNs in the diagnosis and management of smoking cessation, obesity, and depression. It is currently being tested in a randomized, controlled trial (RCT) in a sample of APN students to determine the effect on adherence to clinical practice guideline (CPG) recommendations. Tools such as MODS-APN have the potential to increase CPG adherence, enhance evidence-based practice, promote patient safety, and in the long term improve patient outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Innovative nursing education methods became essential due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Immersive Virtual Reality (VR) education offers nursing students authentic patient encounters in a realistic simulated environment. A pilot study was conducted to identify nursing education clinical scenarios that should be developed for immersive VR and to assess students' perception of immersive VR in education. We formed a focus group composed of nursing faculty (N=10) with expertise in the clinical setting and simulation. Faculty participants identified important topics and aspects of immersive VR scenarios during focus group discussions. We assessed nursing student participants' (N=11) perception of immersive VR in nursing education using a VR game (Anatomy Explorer 2020). Most student participants indicated that a VR game was immersive and realistic and recommended using immersive VR to learn clinical nursing skills. Realistic immersive VR clinical education scenarios could result in effective clinical nursing education., (©2022 AMIA - All rights reserved.)

Nursing has embraced flexible online advanced education as a means of increasing the supply of nurse professionals. Virtual simulation and other adaptive learning technologies enhance learning efficiency and student outcomes. A simulated electronic health record (DocuCare) was adopted in an online graduate nursing informatics course. An assignment using DocuCare to learn core concepts of nursing informatics was developed for graduate students enrolled in a nursing informatics course. A validated standard informatics survey instrument was used to measure three individual domains (basic computer skills, roles, and advanced computer skills (clinical informatics)) as well as the combined informatics competency level. Overall, the nursing informatics competency level was between competent and proficient; basic computer skills and roles were above proficient; and advanced computer skills (clinical informatics) fell between competence and proficient levels.

Studies indicate opioid prevention programs should be designed differently for men and women. Since a website is an effective means of providing behavioral interventions, tailoring one to meet the specific needs of women is a logical step in assisting them to overcome opioid misuse. We identified essential components for inclusion in a website following a community engagement project.