How Technology Makes Nurses Better Data Scientists

Think about it: nurses have always been data scientists, and many of them may not even realize it! Nurses collect and use data constantly, from tick sheets, to MARs, to assessments, they access numerous data sources, determine what the correlations are, and create plans based on their findings. But thanks to the growth of automated data collection and analysis systems, the tedious part of care planning has become outdated. Nurses now have the opportunity to steer plans of care to better outcomes in real-time — without all the tedious work.

Data Without Context is Just Noise

Previously, a Director of Nursing (DON) would spend days or weeks doing QA activities, collecting data to ensure that care plans were completed, reviews were being conducted, and audits finished. Manually gathering the information they needed from the EHR or other sources was incredibly time-consuming, both mentally and physically, and kept DONs from focusing on more important parts of their jobs. Often, by the time they were ready to use the data, it was four-to-six weeks old and no longer relevant.

Today, data collection has improved beyond anything a DON could ever do on paper. The DON’s process has changed, with a system providing a third-party view — oversight not previously available —that aggregates and gives context to the data at a whole new level. It’s doing the hard work previously done by DONs, and makes it available to them on dashboards and in real-time reports. They can complete QA responsibilities in much less time, freeing them to focus more of their time and attention on holistic resident care, occupancy improvement, and risk reduction.

The Better the Data, The Better the Insights

With data coming at nursing staff in a different format and from new sources, DONs need to help their nurses adapt. By having the information up-front and all in one place, DONs can be educative with the nursing team, not punitive. They must remind nurses they’re getting more timely data, and need to incorporate it into care. It’s not enough for nurses to just look at the data; they need to understand it. 

Nurses must learn:

• Where the data points are located
• How to leverage them to define better care approaches

With the right system, nurses can be proactive rather than reactive. With outputs that reflect data being collected and analyzed all the time, they can now quickly and easily identify where and how to act.

Increased Visibility Improves Results

By incorporating a process-based care delivery process combined with deep clinical insights, you and your staff can be empowered to deliver consistent, repeatable care to drive better outcomes.