A day in the life of ..............

[rninformatics, DNP, RN]

more "Day in the life" articles from NI nurses!

http://www.technology-colleges.info/clinical_systems_analyst.html

http://www.technology-colleges.info/VP_nursing_informatics.html

http://www.hospitalsoup.com/medical/nursing-informatics-salary-and-job-description/

http://community.advanceweb.com/blogs/nurses_18/archive/2011/07/06/a-day-in-the-life-of-a-healthcare-information-technology-consultant.aspx

http://healthcareittoday.com/2010/09/15/rn-director-of-clinical-informatics/

PLEASE share your "Day in the Life" Nursing Informatics expriences here so that those thinking about entering Nursing Informatics can get a glimpse of what its like to practice in this wonderful specialty!

[nkochrn, RN]

I JUST started this job on Oct. 3rd with no prior training in IT, just floor nursing. I am learning A LOT! Today has been the probably one of the most productive days I've had yet!!! So here is my day, I don't keep track of the time exactly, so it's just a rough estimate.

07:50-Clock in, head to my office, check emails, look at this board, as well as a google group specifically for users of HMS (which is SUPER helpful!). Check to see if nursing orders are getting put in as 'miscellaneous orders' so I can add them to the list of nursing orders if needed.

08:30-Work on building discharge orders, which we are not yet doing electronically.

09:15- Morning Break time, where I usually visit with my Granny who works in housekeeping.

09:30- Go talk to PT about their charges not dropping, also one of their forms has started printing a second page with just a line on it.

10:00- Back to my office, Check emails again, email received from lab that one of their CPT codes isn't correct and needs changed. Check with IT supervisor about this, but in the meantime the business office fixed it.

10:15- Call customer support about PT's issues with charges, need to talk to business office, so go talk to them. Didn't get anything accomplished with the charges there. Worked on changing PT's form so it will only print on 1 page while on hold.

11:00- Look for information on Meaninful use to educate nurses at next month's nurse's meeting.

11:30- Lunch out with the hubby :)

12:05- Back to work, looked at PT's forms and figured out that charges weren't linked to them, fixed this problem and checked to make sure they are dropping, they are, but each one is printing on a seperate page in PT and they don't want this to print at all. Call customer support again and figured out how to fix this. PT's issues that have been ongoing for 6 months are now solved. (crossing fingers that it all works smoothly tomorrow anyway!)

2:00- Go talk to floor nursing supervisor

2:30- Add meds to cardiac Rehabs order sets. Answer some questions for her about finding things in the archives.

3:00- Discussed adding charges to outpatient tx sheet so they wouldn't have to be done on paper with the floor ward clerk a.k.a. My mom, who tells me exactly what she thinks of that idea! lol.

3:30- floor nursing can't find a frequency on the home meds for dailysat, advised to look for wklysat and found.

3:30-return to office, check emails again

03:45- use my afternoon break to type this :)

04:00- Continue researching meaningful use info for nurses and work on Discharge instructions a little more.

I'd normally leave at 4:30, but I'm staying until 5 all week so I can leave early on Friday for a weekend camping :) My hours are really pretty flexible and probably my favorite part of this job!

[ThanksForAllTheFish!]

I love this thread and have read it many times. I was just wondering if anyone else can add/update "a day in the life" for this insightful thread. I am hoping at some point to shadow the informatics nurse at my hospital, but in the meantime . . . I thirst for knowlege. Need more input. lol Thanks to all that have posted!

[mmc51264, BSN, MSN, RN]

I am applying to grad school to get my MSN in informatics. Became interested when we transitioned to EPIC. Hoping to be able to stay in my health system (huge). Love reading the posts! I, too, have limited IT experience but will have about 8 years of floor experience when I am done (if I get in). as an older new nurse, I am looking ahead to have options when floor nursing may too taxing, physically.

[annaojoanna]

hi. i am a BSN-RN in Virginia and i am interested in becoming a nurse informaticist. do you have any advice or recommendations on how to start with this field of nursing? please email me at [email protected] thank you so much!

[mydesygn]

I'm not exactly a nurse informaticist but a nurse who works as a systems analyst... My day

08: 00 spend an hour reading and responding to email. Most consist of questions / tasks regarding projects

09: 00 review the ticket que - I see 2 tickets to (1) build new orders for our EHR and the (2) other to update an orderset - I review the tickets and revise the orderset in both our Live (Production) system and Test. the second ticket I email our nurse informaticist - it's from a nurse manager requesting an order to remind the nurses to complete an assessment - question whether this is appropriate as an order - possibly better suited as a nursing assessment

10:00 attend CPOE committee meeting

11:00 lunch

11:30 testing new custom developed application - found 2 crash errors, functionality for approval working for all physicians instead of design

12:30 more email

1300 attending project meeting

1400 EHR running slow - called major outage - turns out to be a network issue not EHR related

1430 meet with case management

1530 spent next 2 hrs working on report to display patients pending lab orders

1630 chatted with co workers regarding earlier outage

1700 went home

[bryantyler_]

i would love to get into HEALTH informatics, but i have NO clinical experience whatsoever. My school has a regular informatics degree plan, where i'm assuming its focuses more universally on stuff other than health care administration. What would you recommend me to do?

[bkprncss]

rninformatics

Thank you so much for putting this information up it really allows others a peek into the informatic life.

ShaKeba

[rondmcisme]

So many many meetings is all I can say.

[Michelletrekas]

Hi,

would anyone be be willing to answer 6 interview questions related to RN informatics?

Please e-mail me at [email protected]

Thank you in advance.

Michelle

[sweetlilwolf]

No clinical experience? Are you an RN? You might be able to try to get in as an analyst

[tpatel6112]

This is a great post even after all these years! Thank you to those who had taken the time to share their daily experience in this field. I am very interested in informatics so any and all information is very helpful.