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Executive Summary
* Rather than examine the breadth and depth of the nursing shortage, the authors explore the shortage of tools being employed to leverage today's nurse.
* The authors point out examples of technologies that are available in other industries, such as the restaurant business, that have not been applied to health care.
* In other instances, technologies exist to support every phase of the nursing process, but are not widely implemented.
* Examples of these technologies include point of care testing devices, fully integrated medical records, SMART cards, interactive reference tools, and automated medication systems.
* Wireless technology enables innumerable forms of intervention at the bedside, by telemedicine, and in home care.
* Albeit costly, the proliferation of technology offers a viable opportunity to bring significant support to a limited number of nurses.
Although automation and the use of technology may not be directly correlated with improved recruitment and retention, it is becoming part of comprehensive strategy to address nursing needs (Case, Mowry, & Welebob, 2002).
EVERYDAY WE ARE reminded there are not enough nurses in the United States and around the globe. While enrollments in nursing schools have increased and will undoubtedly provide more graduates in the future, it appears this may only be a quick fix for a much more complicated problem and may not address the very complex issues related to nursing practice, not necessarily the nurse shortage. According to U.S. Labor Secretary Lynn Martin, "This crisis will not be short-term. As a society we must be prepared to stay focused on this challenge for a significant period of time" (Legislative Network for Nurses, 2002, p. 3).
In this article, the authors will not address what has already been studied, written about, debated, and discussed regarding the need for better staffing ratios, better working environments, and better benefits for nurses. Those goals must be accomplished if nurses are to provide the care that is needed now and, more importantly, in the future when the population will be older and need more healthcare. This article is about something very different. It is about the need to provide nurses with the tools and the skills used by other professions so they can deliver quality care using the most up-to-date technology available....