Supporting the scholar role in intensive care nursing

Area of Science:

• Nursing Informatics
• Healthcare Professional Development
• Organizational Learning

Background:

• Intensive care nurses (ICU nurses) require continuous learning to adapt to evolving healthcare demands.
• Informatics applications have the potential to support but also challenge professional growth.
• A model of the nursing process identifies three roles: practitioner, scholar, and human.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how informatics applications can support and challenge intensive care nurses' continuous growth and learning.
• To focus on the scholar role within the nursing process model.
• To identify learning strategies adopted by ICU nurses.

Main Methods:

• A research-and-design tool based on a nursing process model was utilized.
• Twenty-eight intensive care staff members from six hospitals participated.
• Participants recounted experiences from the perspectives of practitioner, scholar, and human roles.

Main Results:

• Seventy-seven learning strategies were identified for the scholar role.
• Individual learning strategies included reflection on past and present patient cases, and personal decisions.
• Organizational learning strategies involved team evaluations, autopsy observation, and peer feedback.

Conclusions:

• Design implications for future nursing informatics applications were defined based on identified learning strategies.
• Informatics can be designed to better support the scholar role of ICU nurses.
• Continuous learning is crucial for ICU nurses, supported by effective informatics tools.