NURS 6051 THE INCLUSION OF NURSES IN THE SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT LIFE CYCLE
Resistance to change that is forced upon you is a normal response. Any implementation of new technology is a major change to any organization (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017). Therefore, if a healthcare organization desires to be successful in the implementation a new software or any program that affects the delivery of nursing care, that organization must involve the nurses (laureate education, 2018). Information technologists are experts at technology in the same way, nurses are experts at nursing. If technology is to successfully invade nursing, then nurses are the key to that invasion. Planning, design, implementation and evaluation, are the stages of a systems development life cycle (SDLC) ((laureate education, 2018).
According to Weckman and Janzen (2009), Nurses who work at the point of care should always be involved in every phase of the SDLC if the healthcare organization expects a smooth transition (p. 1). Most of the time for a new software implementation is spent on planning, therefore if nurses are not involved in the planning, phase the organization will miss the opportunity to identify problems that will affect the flow of patient care (Hamer & Cipriano, 2013). It is also important to note that without the input of nurses for the planning, the implementation and evaluation phases will be a struggle. The best way to get nurses to buy in on change is to get them involved in the decision-making process (Weckman & Janzen, 2009). This allows the organization to get real time feedback on the different aspects of the program from the very people who will be using it the most. Then, the nurses would be less likely to be negative and give push back with the change.
When the hospital where I worked had planned to move from CERNER to Epic, they were wise to recruit nurses to represent every in-patient and out-patient area of the hospital. I believe that the organization realized the importance of positive nurse involvement since they wanted an effective and successful launch of the program. The nurses were able to give feedback on what should or should not be included based on their every-day interaction with the patients at the point of care. When the “Go Live” date came, the nurses were nervous about the change but knew that they could adjust because it was generated based on their needs. The implementation was made easier by the “Nurse Super Users” who spent most of their time helping with the design and planning and as such they knew the program software very well. The evaluation phase of our Epic program was of great benefit to the organization. Since they already had nurses involved in the planning, designing and implementation of Epic, the nurses wanted to do the evaluation because by then, they were already invested, and they knew that appropriate evaluation would improve the program for them in the future.
References
Hamer, S., & Cipriano, P. (2013). Involving nurses in developing new technology. Nursing Times, 109(47), 18–19
Laureate Education (Producer). (2018). Systems Implementation [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.
McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K. G. (2017). Nursing informatics and the foundation of knowledge (4th ed.). Chapter 13, “Workflow and Beyond Meaningful Use” (pp. 245–261).
Weckman, H., Janzen, S., (2009) “The Critical Nature of Early Nursing Involvement for Introducing New Technologies” OJIN: The Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, Vol. 14, No. 2, Manuscript 2. https://doi-org.10.3912/OJIN.Vol14No02Man02
