The Role of Graduate Nurses in IT-Based Nursing Documentation Systems

This report examines the crucial role of graduate-level nurses in assisting nurse leaders during the implementation of information technology-based nursing documentation systems. The analysis is structured around the Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC), encompassing planning, requirement definition, analysis, design, implementation, and post-implementation support. The report outlines specific responsibilities for graduate nurses at each stage, such as assisting in planning, collecting and analyzing data related to existing systems, designing training materials, preparing training resources, and monitoring the system's performance. The report emphasizes the importance of nursing documentation in professional practice, highlighting its role in reducing errors and improving coding accuracy. The involvement of graduate nurses in this process is crucial for understanding the significance of nursing documentation in modern healthcare environments.

Running head: NURSING
Nursing
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1
NURSING
Nursing documentation system is an important aspect of the nursing practice. It helps
to avoid the chances of unwanted errors like medication errors. The proper implementation of
the nursing documentation system must be done in such a way that it is usable and is easily
acceptable for the nurses (Alkouri, AlKhatib & Kawafhah, 2016). The following assignment
will provide the description of the role of graduate level nurses in assisting a nurse leader in
the process of implementation of the information technology based nursing documentation
system. The role description will be based on the SDLC (Systems Development Life Cycle)
stages.
The first stage of the SDLC is planning and requirement definition. Under this step
the planning of implementing new system occurs (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017). The role of
the graduate nurse will be to assist the nurse leader in doing the proper planning. However,
before taking active part in the planning process a graduate level nurse must study the
different components involved in the process of nursing documentation and the importance of
nursing documentation in professional practice. Proper nursing documentation helps in
improving the accuracy of coding and also aids in prescribing formulary medications,
avoiding the chances of medication errors (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality,
2018).
Analysis is the second stage of SDLC. It deals with defining of the project goals in
defined functions and operations for intended applications. It mainly involves the overall
process of gathering and subsequent interpreting facts and other diagnosing problems along
with recommendation for improving the level of practice (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017).
Under this stage, the role of the graduate will be to collect facts that are dealing with nursing
documentation followed by scrutinizing the existing system and assisting the team leaders in
analyzing the proposed system (Jensen, Kushniruk & Nøhr, 2015).

2
NURSING
The third step of SDLC is design of the new system. Here nursing documentation
system is already been designed beforehand. Thus, this step will mainly involve designing of
the training manual for educating the nurses about the process of systematic implementation
of nursing documentation (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017).The role of the graduate nurse will
be to first understand the design of the nursing documentation system in information
technology format followed by designing of the training material.
Implementation: The fourth step of implementation will deal with giving training to
the nursing professionals for comprehensive implementation of IT based documentation
system (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017). The role of the graduate nursing professional will be
to prepare the training manual in the form of power-point presentation of e-posters for the
nurse leaders. This will help the nurse leader to get ready-made training materials and make
subsequent modifications if any (Jensen, Kushniruk & Nøhr, 2015).
Post-implementation support: The last stage of the SDLC system deals with the post-
implementation support (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017). The post-implementation system
will deal with giving encouragement to the nursing professionals to get accustomed to and to
use the system in an enthusiastic way. Here the graduate nursing professionals have no
significant role. However, in the post-implementation system, the duty also entails proper
monitoring of the system in order to crosscheck whether the system is encountering any error
or whether the nurses are well equipped with the process. The graduate nurses can do this by
taking help from the information technology professionals (Cho et al., 2016).
Overall, it can be said that the assisting the nurse manager in the domain of
implementation of the nursing documentation system will help the graduate nurses to
understand the importance of the nursing documentation.

3
NURSING
Reference
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. (2018). Health IT evaluation toolkit and
evaluation measures quick reference guide. Access date: September 31 2019.
Retrieved from https://healthit.ahrq.gov/health-it-tools-and-resources/evaluation-
resources/health-it-evaluation-toolkit-and-evaluation-measures-quick-reference
Alkouri, O. A., AlKhatib, A. J., & Kawafhah, M. (2016). Importance and implementation of
nursing documentation: review study. European Scientific Journal, 12(3).
Cho, I., Kim, E., Choi, W. H., & Staggers, N. (2016). Comparing usability testing outcomes
and functions of six electronic nursing record systems. International journal of
medical informatics, 88, 78-85.
Jensen, S., Kushniruk, A. W., & Nøhr, C. (2015). Clinical simulation: A method for
development and evaluation of clinical information systems. Journal of biomedical
informatics, 54, 65-76.
McGonigle, D., &Mastrian, K. G. (2017).Nursing informatics and the foundation of
knowledge (4th ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning. Chapter 9: Systems
Development Life Cycle: Nursing Informatics and Organizational Decision Making”
(pp. 175–187)