Using Pocket PCs for Nurses' Shift Reports and Patient Care

Abstract

Nurses working in hospitals with paper-based systems often face the challenge of inefficiency in providing quality nursing care. Two areas of inefficiency are shiftto- shift communication among nurses, and access to information related to patient care. An integrated IT system, consisting of Pocket PCs and a desktop PC interfaced to a hospital’s mainframe system, was developed. The goal was to use mobile IT to give nurses easier access to patient information. This chapter describes the development of this system and reports the results of a pilot study: a comparison of time spent in taking and giving shift reports before and after the study and nurses’ perceptions of the mobile IT system. Results showed a significant difference in taking shift reports and no significant difference in giving shift reports. Nurses stated that quick and easy access to updated patient information in the Pocket PC was very helpful, especially during mainframe downtime.