Response instructions:
Respond to at least two of your colleagues* , asking questions to help clarify the scenario and application of data, or offering additional/alternative ideas for the application of nursing informatics principles.
#1 Abimbola Ogbunuju (She/Her)
One of the most important things hospitals can do to improve patient safety and healthcare outcomes is to cut down on medication errors. Nurses in leadership positions may learn a lot about what causes medication errors and how to best fix them by analyzing different kinds of data and using efficient methods of collecting and accessing that data (Zhou et al., 2018).
In this scenario, many kinds of data were utilized, including incident reports, training records, patient outcomes data, staffing schedules, drug administration records, and incident reports, to offer a thorough understanding of the causes that lead to medication errors. Systemic problems affecting drug safety in the hospital unit can be better understood by nurse leaders via analysis of various data sources (Afaya et al., 2021).
We can learn a lot about what causes pharmaceutical mistakes by collecting data in certain ways, such as using electronic health records (EHRs), creating a confidential reporting system, and asking staff members to fill out questionnaires and give us their honest opinions. Better patient care outcomes and fewer mistakes can result from using this information to guide evidence-based decision-making.
Nurse leaders use clinical reasoning and judgment in the following ways to advance ongoing progress: by observing patterns, evaluating current practices, confidently choosing treatments, putting changes into action based on evidence, and commenting on results. To promote a culture of quality care and patient safety in the healthcare context, their role in transforming data-derived information into practice improvement is vital (Sevy Majers & Warshawsky, 2020).
In summary, nursing leaders can tackle the pressing problem of medication mistakes and help develop system-wide best practices in medication management by making good use of data and clinical reasoning when making decisions. This method highlights how data-driven decisions may improve healthcare quality and patient outcomes.
References
Afaya, A., Konlan, K. D., & Kim Do, H. (2021, October 25). Improving patient safety through identifying barriers to reporting medication administration errors among nurses: an integrative review. BMC Health Services Research, 21(1). to an external site.
Sevy Majers, J., & Warshawsky, N. (2020, October). Evidence-Based Decision-Making for Nurse Leaders. Nurse Leader, 18(5), 471475.
Zhou, S., Kang, H., Yao, B., & Gong, Y. (2018, December). An automated pipeline for analyzing medication event reports in clinical settings. BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making, 18(S5). to an external site.
#2 Melonie Gonzales
Application of Data to Problem-Solving
Safe staffing ratios in hospitals have been a major topic in the healthcare headlines for several years. This has resulted in nurses advocating and demanding policy changes to accommodate the issue. A handful of states legislators have listened and passed laws for safer nurse-to-patient ratios, but unfortunately, several states have not. Lasater et al. (2021) mention that safer staffing ratios can improve patient outcomes, fewer hospital readmissions, decrease adverse events, and improve employee satisfaction. Ultimately, this leads to money saved by hospitals and healthcare organizations.
Luckily, informatics has become an easily accessible tool for nurses, leaders, and advocators to access and collect data to back up their fight for safer staffing ratios. According to Hughes (2023), leaders should use different data types available to inform decision-making and solve problems. Nurse leaders are required to use clinical reasoning and judgment along with data analysis to form knowledge of improving healthcare issues.
Several data platforms can be used to find information on safe staffing. Electronic Medical Records (EMRs) can be used to find patient information during hospitalizations. Quality Improvement data can be used to find information on adverse events or incident reports during hospitalizations. Scheduling records can be used to find staffing ratios during incident reports and adverse events.
Evidence-based practice has been guiding healthcare for the last decade, and this also requires data research. Therefore, nurse leaders must understand how to use informatics to research evidence-based and peer-reviewed articles on safe staffing ratios and analyze data collected to make changes or implement new policies. According to Paulsen (2018), large data set studies have shown that nurse staffing ratios affect patient outcomes. This shows that leaders require data collection and analysis to implement changes. Data is also used during the process of policy change and implementation.
References
Hughes, R. (March 2023). Recognizing the value of data. Nursing Management. 54(3). DOI: 10.1097/01.NUMA.0000919080.84084.ed
Lasater, K. B., Aiken, L. H., Sloane, D., French, R., Martin, B., Alexander, M., & McHugh, M. D. (2021). Original research: Patient outcomes and cost savings associated with hospital safe nurse staffing legislation. An observational study. BMJ Open, 11(12).
Paulsen, R. A. (July 2018). Taking nurse staffing research to the unit level. Nursing Management. 49(7). DOI: 10.1097/01.NUMA.0000538915.53159.b5
