Post-Implementation Study of a Nursing e-Chart: How Nurses Use Their Time.

Nursing documentation is a significant component of electronic health records nevertheless integrating a new chart into nursing activities required multiples strategies to ensure adherence. Current literature demonstrates that nurses spend part of their time performing activities no related with patients' direct care and sometimes even does not fall under their purview. Thus it is important to quantify the effect that a new system could have in the proportion of time dedicated to documentation.

Computerization of a Nursing Chart According to the Nursing Process.

The benefits associated with the computerization of clinical records are known since a long time ago. Documentation evolution from paper to electronic format aims to always improve communication, reduce errors and facilitate continuity of care. Ideally when improvements to nursing records are contemplated, they should consider the nurses needs, new functionality workflow impacts and correspondence with representation models of standardized data that are specific to their domains practices.

User-Centered Design Practices to Redesign a Nursing e-Chart in Line with the Nursing Process.

Regarding the user-centered design (UCD) practices carried out at Hospital Italiano of Buenos Aires, nursing e-chart user interface was redesigned in order to improve records' quality of nursing process based on an adapted Virginia Henderson theoretical model and patient safety standards to fulfil Joint Commission accreditation requirements. UCD practices were applied as standardized and recommended for electronic medical records usability evaluation. Implementation of these practices yielded a series of prototypes in 5 iterative cycles of incremental improvements to achieve goals of usability which were used and perceived as satisfactory by general care nurses.

Pre-Implementation Study of a Nursing e-Chart: How Nurses Use Their Time.

In clinical practice, nurses perform different activities that exceed direct care of patients, and influence workload and time administration among different tasks. When implementing changes in an electronic nursing record, it is important to measure how it affects the time committed to documentation. The objective of this study was to determine the time dedicated to different activities, including those related to electronic documentation prior to implementing a redesigned nurse chart in an Electronic Health Record at the Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires.

Nurses' expectations and perceptions of a redesigned Electronic Health Record.

When a new Electronic Health Record is implemented or modifications are made, the full acceptance by end users depends on their expectations and perceptions about the possible benefits and the potential impacts on care quality. The redesign of an electronic nurse chart should consider the inherent characteristics of nurses' practice and the variables that may influence the implementation and use of the new chart. In this study, a qualitative method evaluated nurses' expectations and perceptions about the implementation impacts of a redesigned nurse chart in an electronic health record at Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires.