Technology taking over

NoviceRN10 · Feb 15, 2012

I love electronic charting.

dudette10, MSN, RN · Feb 15, 2012

There will be a learning curve, but I think it will generally be beneficial for everyone. I think the key here is making sure that the providers enter their own orders, rather than verbally telling the nurses and asking them to do it. That requirement will need to be enforced from the get-go, otherwise the providers will never feel the need to learn the system and do it themselves.

From what I understand, CPOE has a background program running for clinical decision-making. Not using CPOE and verbally providing orders skips over this safety mechanism.

RNperdiem, RN · Feb 15, 2012

I still prefer paper, but I adapt to the changes.

MunoRN, RN · Feb 15, 2012

18 years ago I was on vacation 3,000 miles from home (stick with me here). I ordered pizza, gave them only my name and they said "Oh, would you like your regular order?" (Lg pepperoni and olive). That was 1994 and a national database of my pizza eating history had already been established. I think the fact that here we are in 2012 and we are still working on achieving the same level of technology in healthcare that Round Table had in 1994 is a national embarrassment.

evolvingrn, BSN, RN · Feb 15, 2012

Its safer for the patient and easy to do...what's the probelm?

paddler · Feb 16, 2012

Love it! What I don't like is hybrid charting where there is a computer that is only useful for certain things and there is still paper. I hate paper but what I hate worse is doing BOTH. Needless duplication often occurs as a result of this. Hybrid charts happen during the transition to computers and it sucks. I seriously don't know how patients survived and how people got their jobs done efficiently before computers.

ckh23, BSN, RN · Feb 16, 2012

Great. I can click and type faster than I can write. And my handwriting isn't the best. Also makes it easier to read past notes and not have to decipher someone else's handwriting.

canigraduate · Feb 16, 2012

I'm with MunoRN. When I first entered healthcare I was appalled at how archaic the record-keeping system was. I had a better database for my video games.

Guttercat, ASN, RN · Feb 16, 2012

Depends on the software.

Ours was coded by five dweebs passing around a bowl.

mama_d, BSN, RN · Feb 16, 2012

Love love love it. The best is having all those records from our entire system (and many of our affiliated physicians) available at the click of a mouse.

There are of course some bugs still in the system, but they're pretty good at taking feedback from the floor staff and implementing changes with the patches. We have an established system of communication that runs from floor staff to the project specialists, and incredibly helpful people that run the helpdesk. Essential to the high functionality of the system IMO.

Ruby Vee, BSN · Feb 16, 2012

i've worked with electronic charting in one form or another since the late 80s. there's wonderful software out there, and there's software that can make you rip your hair out while wishing you had an axe to take to the hardware. currently, we're using some of the latter thanks to a recent "upgrade." change comes slowly, if at all, and administration announced from the outset that "we're not changing our programming just to make the nurses' jobs easier." meanwhile, i'm discovering new "bugs" almost daily. in taking care of my first vad patient since the "upgrade," i discovered that the software won't let me enter in any values outside of the "normal range." so as my patient slowly circles the drain, i'm forced to enter most of my vad parameters in as "comments." that means that the providers who are trying to follow my patient's trends can't just follow a graph . . . they also have to click in every little cell and read the comments. it's frustrating and time consuming for all of us.

i no longer miss my paper charting, and the electronic chart does most of the calculations for me that i once did by long division on a paper towel. (cardiac outputs, indices, svrs, drip calculations, i & os.) i've stopped carrying a calculator in my pocket. it's convenient that i can be putting my vital signs into the computer in my patient's room, and the provider can be reading them in his office down the hall . . . or in his hotel room across the country. although there are plusses and minuses to that, too. (more than once, the attending has been presenting a paper in california having signed out to a partner, and i'll get a long distance call wanting to know what the )(&^% that #(&^% thought he was doing when he started this drug instead of that one. what i'd like to ask him is why he doesn't call the covering provider to blister his ears instead of mine.)

despite the fact that i'm sure i qualify as one of those crusty old nurses -- i prefer to call myself "seasoned" -- i've adapted very well to electronic charting. and email . . . although i wish there was a way to "unsubscribe" from the fury of emails requesting switches every time the schedule comes out. there are some colleagues that want to switch every single shift they're scheduled for! i'm excited about our unit website coming out this spring, because it will allow us to post policy/procedure changes, updates on equipment, research etc. perhaps we'll be able to see the bathroom walls again.