What is Throughput Flow

Much of healthcare improvement via technology initiatives address gaining physician by-in (Reinertsen, 2005) and does not adequately address engaging nurses, despite the fact that nurses serve as the front-line care givers and are a primary user group (Wiley-Patton and Malloy, 2004). However, the tide is changing and visibility of nurses as information gatherers and processors in the patient care process is increasing (Romano, 2006). Nurses perform the majority of the data oriented tasks involved in patient care and would benefit most from having access to information at the point of care (Bove, 2006). RADM Romano, Chief Professional Officer of Nursing and advisor to the US Surgeon General concerning public health, recently addressed the American Informatics Nursing Informatics Association and stated “This is the year of the nurse. The technologies that have the means to improve the efficiencies in patient care are in the hands of the nurses.” Nurses need to embrace technology in everyday work or continue suffering the consequences of antiquated methods of computing that take us away from where we work – at the point of care (Abbott, 2006).