Documentation in nursing is a process that is almost as important as the treatment procedure. This is why the article above points out the issue in a detailed manner. The article describes gaps as any inaccurate or missing information that may be inconsistent when evaluated. Mishaps are the result of these gaps which may result in medical inconsistencies. Overlaps are a different type of problem that occur because patient details have been duplicated. All these are as a result of mistakes made during record keeping. The article compares mistakes made during manual record keeping and others made in digital record keeping ( Charalambous & Goldberg, 2016). Other mistakes examined are those that are created when transferring data from manual to digital stores.
The research study uses an interview for the design study. The study was unbiased because the researchers interviewed nurses whom they were not familiar with. Participants were also long serving nurses who had enough history of record keeping. The nurses recorded similar challenges such as time challenges and inaccuracy due to mistakes made by the patients themselves (Meskell et al., 2015). Other challenges included lack of adequate time to fill in gaps or forgetfulness due to high work load and understaffing. Ethical concerns were also noted when the nurse falsified information deliberately to cover their own personal errors. The report stayed relevant to current best practices.
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The article made good recommendations regarding policy and practices that should govern documentation. The study did not provide conclusive recommendations for problems that affected nurses caring for older persons. The most informative part of the article was the suggestion on streamlining the various forms of digital communication (Ostrovsky et al., 2016). This was the surest way to eliminate duplication and repetitive mistakes. In conclusion, the article is informative and accurate in its assessment of the documentation problems.
References
Charalambous, L., & Goldberg, S. (2016). ‘Gaps, mishaps and overlaps’. Nursing documentation: How does it affect care? Journal of research in nursing, 21(8), 638-648.
Meskell, P., Burke, E., Kropmans, T. J., Byrne, E., Setyonugroho, W., & Kennedy, K. M. (2015). Back to the future: An online OSCE Management Information System for nursing OSCEs. Nurse education today, 35(11), 1091-1096.
Ostrovsky, Y., Buttaro, T. M., Diamond, J., & Hayes, J. (2016). Technology and dynamic pathways: how to improve nursing care, documentation, and efficiency. Iproceedings, 2(1), e31.
