Topic
Nurses as Agents of Change
Instructions
As a nurse, you can have a great impact on the success or failure of the adoption of EHRs. It is important for nurses to understand their role as change agents and the ways they can influence others when addressing the challenges of changing to a drastically different way of doing things.
Everett Rogers, a pioneer in the field of the diffusion of innovations, identified five qualities that determine individual attitudes towards adopting new technology (2003). He theorized that individuals are concerned with:
- Relative advantage: The individual adopting the new innovation must see how it will be an improvement over the old way of doing things.
- Compatibility with existing values and practices: The adopter must understand how the new innovation aligns with current practices.
- Simplicity: The adopter must believe he or she can easily master the new technology; the more difficult learning the new system appears, the greater the resistance that will occur.
- Trialability: The adopter should have the opportunity to “play around’ with the new technology and explore its capabilities.
- Observable results: The adopter must have evidence that the proposed innovation has been successful in other situations.
For this Assignment, you assume the role of a nurse facilitator in a small hospital in upstate New York. You have been part of a team preparing for the implementation of a new electronic health records system. Decisions as to the program that will be used have been finalized, and you are now tasked with preparing the nurses for the new system. There has been an undercurrent of resistance expressed by nurses, and you must respond to their concerns. You have a meeting scheduled with the nurses 1 week prior to the training on the new EHR system. Consider how you can use the five qualities outlined by Rogers (2003) to assist in preparing the nurses for the upcoming implementation.
To prepare
- Review the Learning Resources this week about successful implementations of EHRs.
- Consider how you would present the new EHR system to the nurses to win their approval.
- Reflect on the five qualities outlined by Rogers. How would addressing each of those areas improve the likelihood of success?
Write a 3- to 5-page paper which includes the following:
- Using Rogers’ (2003) theory as a foundation, outline how you would approach the meeting with the nurses. Be specific as to the types of information or activities you could provide to address each area and include how you would respond to resistance.
- Analyze the role of nurses as change agents in facilitating the adoption of new technology.
Answer preview
Nurse have been identified as the means through which facilitation and adoption of new technologies can be achieved to improve delivery as well as the quality of health care among patients. It has been noted that the number of individuals who lose their lives every year because of preventable cases such as medical errors that can be prevented has increased at an alarming rate. With such situations, research has been conducted on the means through which such cases can be avoided, and it has been found out that information and technology (IT) have the capability of enhancing the safety of the patients and also improve the continuity and quality of healthcare.
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