Technology has greatly influenced the nursing profession in the past three decades. Peter Drucker used the term knowledge work almost 60 years ago to refer to the shift of the workforce from manual labor towards using information as an asset (Nagle et al., 2017). Notably, standardized nursing is described as the common language through which all nurses document care (Ziebarth, 2018). Nurses use these languages to describe assessments, interventions and outcomes of nursing care (Ziebarth, 2018). As knowledge workers, nurses have access to tremendous amounts of data essential for providing patient-centered care and evidence-based practice (Oreofe & Oyenike, 2018). Understanding this data requires enhanced knowledge, skills, and attitudes towards data analytics and quality improvement.
To begin with, the nurse described by Rutherford is one of many health workers who lack knowledge about the importance of standardized nursing languages. Nagle et al. (2017) estimated that about 22 million households would use virtual care solutions compared to one million in 2013. Nurses must be prepared to adapt to this new mode of delivering healthcare (Nagle et al., 2017). Granted, this unfolding shift in acute care and preventive follow-up services brings greater connectivity between providers and patients (Nagle et al., 2017). In the past, healthcare data documentation has been fragmented due to communication barriers and nurses’ errors. Currently, electronic health record use is a requirement in many countries, meaning that it is the appropriate time to ensure that nursing terminologies are universally understood in clinical practice (Oreofe & Oyenike, 2018). Through standardized nursing terminologies, nurses are capable of collecting data and evaluating it to increase patient safety, care, and outcomes.
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Further, the nursing profession consists of a large segment of professionals who are in frequent interactions with benefits. Due to this depth in roles, nurses must enhance communication with patients through standardized languages (Oreofe & Oyenike, 2018). The use of these languages is beneficial because it facilitates better discourse among nurses. For instance, the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorder (DSM-IV) offers a common language for psychiatric diagnoses (Walden University, 2020). Additionally, nursing languages enhance visibility of nursing interventions. Nurses’ work is often invisible due to use of informal notes and verbal reports (Walden University, 2020). Due to inconsistent documentation, most nurses have insignificant influence on care delivery. According to Ziebarth (2018), nursing languages are beneficial because they increase collaboration between nurses from different specialties, geographic regions, and countries. Nurses and physicians encounter challenges when documenting their findings from standardized nursing languages (Ziebarth, 2018). For example, a patient comes in with lower abdominal pain and the diagnosis indicates epiploic appendagitis. As the physicians tries to relate the diagnosis with the ICD-9 codes, they find no option for epiploic appendagitis and thus pick the closest option, which is diverticulitis (Ziebarth, 2018). This data eventually misleads fellow nurses relying on the same system.
Traditional methods of acquiring new knowledge in the nursing profession include analyzing information from research journals (Nagle et al., 2017). Nurses evaluate this knowledge and convert it into guidelines in evidence-based practice. According to Nagle et al. (2017), it takes about 17 years for evidence to reach clinical practice. The future requires a common system of clinical practice, where specialists have instant access to knowledge collected from all parts of the world (Nagle et al., 2017). With new algorithms, nurses can directly incorporate patient information into hospital databases and create a framework for decision support systems (Nagle et al., 2017). By doing so, they can identify and report languages that lack uniformity in reporting diagnosis.
Consequently, data analytics is the future of the nursing informatics specialist. Current knowledge suggests that nurses will have to deliver individualized care through virtual systems in the future. Due to this increasing integration with technology, nurses must update their knowledge and skills on current systems. Successful nurses have the capability to turn data into knowledge and improve patient care. To reduce the inconsistencies in documenting diagnosis, nursing languages must be updated with every condition despite its prevalence levels. The knowledge worker must engage in continuous learning and competency development. To this end, nurses must understand standardized nursing languages to find, share, and develop knowledge to advance their nursing practice.
References
Nagle, L., Sermeus, W., & Junger, A. (2017). Evolving Role of the Nursing Informatics Specialist. Forecasting Informatics Competencies for Nurses in the Future of Connected Health , 212-221. https://doi.org/10.3233/978-1-61499-738-2-212
Oreofe, A. I., & Oyenike, A. M. (2018). Transforming Practice through Nursing Innovative Patient Centered Care: Standardized Nursing Languages. International Journal of Caring Sciences , 11(2), 1319-1322. https://www.internationaljournalofcaringsciences.org/docs/ 76_oyenike_special_10_5.pdf
Walden University. (2020). The Advantages of Using Standardized Nursing Language . https://www.waldenu.edu/online-masters-programs/master-of-science-in-nursing/resource/the-advantages-of-using-standardized-nursing-language
Ziebarth, D. (2018). Exploring Standardized Nursing Languages: Moving Toward a Faith Community Nursing Intervention. International Journal of Faith Community Nursing , 4(1), 1-21. https://digitalcommons.wku.edu/ijfcn/vol4/iss1/2
