ANIA 2024 Annual Conference

P054 - Hospital-Acquired Fracture Prevention and Tracking within the EHR

Kathleen Klimpel, PhD, CNS, ACHIP, Senior Clinical Informaticist, Rady Children's Hospital

Tags: BPA alert best practice nursing CDS clinical decision suppo

Updated: 05/06/24

Learning outcome: Describe how clinical decision support is used to identify fracture risk and provides clinicians best practice recommendations for the care of patients at risk for fractures.

Children with osteopenia, osteoporosis, and other conditions may have bones that are more fragile and at an increased risk for fractures. Although a hospital-acquired fracture has not yet been identified as a "never event" by CMS or any other regulatory body, any such fracture can incur financial and non-financial costs for patients, nurses, and the organization. A fracture prevention program can improve patient safety, patient satisfaction, and staff competence and can standardize care practices while decreasing organizational costs from preventable fracture events. At this institution, a fracture prevention program was developed that utilized clinical decision support (CDS) in the electronic health record (EHR) to identify patients at risk for iatrogenic fractures.

Data used from the EHR included documentation on the patient’s problem list, assessment of mobility impairment, and age. When patients were identified as being at risk for fracture, a best practice advisory (BPA) recommended standardized care practices. Standardized care practices included safe patient handling practices by all staff including transport personnel, communication of the risk via a precautions flag in the EHR and physical signage in the room, and the initiating of patient and family education. A dietitian consult for bone health assessment and a physical/occupational therapy consult for changes in functional status and/or guidance for safe transfers/positioning were also suggested to be considered as needed for the patient. All clinical staff received targeted education on fragile handling techniques for positioning, holding, diapering, and bathing. That education is now incorporated into routine staff training.

The results after implementing the program were improved care for at-risk patients and decreased fracture events. In the year prior to the initiation of the program, there were 8 hospital-acquired fractures and the average number of days between events was 50. Post-implementation, days between events have been as high as 232. The program is currently being optimized. Next steps are to integrate real-time identification of fracture events with improved documentation and reporting of hospital-acquired fractures. This will improve the capture of fracture events by documenting directly in the EHR versus using a third-party system that is outside of the clinicians’ routine workflow. This new documentation will enable real-time evaluation of events that do occur and support ongoing rapid cycle improvements going forward.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P052 - MACROS: A Tool to Decrease Nursing Documentation Burden

Gwendolyn Holder, MSN, RN, NI-BC, Director Nursing Informatics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center

Tags: documentation burden reduction efficiency

Updated: 05/06/24

In the literature, nurses cite documentation burden as one of the most significant barriers to the patient and family experience, efficacy, and nurse well-being. This finding was echoed by participants of the Vanderbilt nursing informatics committees (VNIC), a shared governance committee comprised of front-line nurses. The vendor offered macro functionality that was projected to reduce documentation time and VNIC approved proceeding with efforts to customize the build.

A shared governance approach was utilized to customize the build of the macros. The initial build for the macros was received from the vendor, and high-level decisions such as if personalized macros would be allowed were made by the VNIC. A project manager and the nursing informatics team coordinated meetings with subject matter experts, training team, and analyst to provide input on the macros needs. 227 macros were built. With one click of a macro a nurse can save many clicks; for documentation of a normal IV assessment a macro saves 3 clicks and with an assessment, it can save as many as 15. The eStar training team developed a quick hit 5-minute training video, and other tip sheets were incorporated into the upgraded training materials. Sessions were conducted at the VNIC subcommittee sessions and the macros were publicized in various forums. During implementation support, end users were shown macros appropriate for their areas.

At the time of the original poster submission, only anecdotal results are available, but staff response has been overwhelmingly positive. A flowsheet macro dashboard has been launched and results will be presented by entity. Feedback sessions will be conducted at the VNIC sessions and results will be shared. Time-saving estimates for an acute inpatient nurse using just 3 macros per shift on a 6-patient assignment with 3 shifts a week could save 2088 clicks or 35 minutes per month. An ICU nurse could save 88.5 minutes per month. Extrapolating this time-savings to a large number of inpatient nurses can have a definite impact on reduction of burden.
This poster will share the 6-month results from the staff survey as well as quantitative system data. Implications for practice and lessons learned will be covered as well.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P051 - Leveraging Vendor Relationships to Improve Collaborations and Nursing Workflow in a Large VA Medical Center

Zayra Bowman, MSN/MBA, RN, NI-BC | Benjamin Heyka, MSN, RN | Anisa Hilliard, MSN, RN | John Mugongo, MS, RN

Tags: nursing informatics optimization vendor collaboration device integration nurse call system

Updated: 05/06/24

Purpose: In today’s world, nursing informatics works with a multitude of technologies and equipment from a variety of vendors that are used to facilitate and enhance the footprint of nurses at the beside. Studies show that nurses at the bedside benefit with improved workflows when nursing informatics is involved in the preliminary discussions and planning phases of technology and equipment. Studies also suggest that vendor collaboration between nursing informatics and vendors improves outcomes. Therefore, the purpose of this project was to perform a needs assessment collaboratively with our nurse call system vendor to gain insight into areas in need of optimization.

Description: Our team collaborated with the vendor’s clinical consultants to perform an onsite needs assessment of our nurse call system with a specific focus in long-term, spinal cord, and acute care areas. The needs assessment objective was to gain detailed insight of the current usage of the nurse call system and provide suggestions for optimization to improve nursing workflow. The unique needs of each nursing area, ways in which the nurse call system equipment was utilized, and nursing workarounds were assessed. Nursing informatics facilitated the needs assessment by guiding nurse managers and front-line nursing staff to meet with the vendor’s clinical consultant representatives. Our nursing informatics team and the vendor collaborated to develop an itinerary prior to the onsite visit which included spending 30 minutes on each unit. While in each unit, vendor representatives interacted with clinical staff who were able to demonstrate how they were using current nurse call system and integrated products, and the representatives were able offer on the spot solutions to optimize processes. The vendor team then came back onsite to present a detailed summary of opportunities pointed at optimization of current products approximately six weeks post-visit.

Evaluation/outcomes: With high levels of nursing staff engagement and enthusiasm, the vendor team was able to complete a thorough assessment which offered solutions to improve our current nurse call system utilization and workflow. This included reviewing clinical and operational requirements, pain points, optimizations, and a future roadmap. Specific interventions included status board access and education, a complete system configuration review, locator badge battery best practices, and future opportunities with the updating of our bed fleet. As we continue to improve nursing workflow on our inpatient units, vendor collaboration must be sustained to achieve optimal clinical outcomes.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P050 - Optimizing Utilization of the Discharge Lounge with Technology

Tip R. Tilton, MSN, RN

Tags: patient flow throughput discharge lounge eligibility identification discharge increase utilization

Updated: 05/06/24

Background: Timely inpatient hospital bed availability is an essential component to improving patient throughput. To improve patient flow at a large academic medical center and address capacity challenges, the discharge lounge (DCL) was implemented. The DCL provides a safe alternative space for patients to await transition to their final discharge destination once their medical and nursing care have been completed. The main purpose of establishing a DCL is to increase availability of inpatient beds, thereby expediting patient flow. Despite multiple attempts, the DCL experienced low utilization. The gap in the current DCL process was the labor-intensive identification of patients eligible for the DCL as well as the tracking of its usage. Technology is a potential solution to this problem.

Purpose: The purpose of this poster presentation is to describe the workflow design for optimizing healthcare technology by developing an electronic DCL patient identification tool, evaluate its impact on the volume of eligible patients, and share the improvements seen in the DCL utilization rate.

Design and implementation: DCL RNs discussed and defined the eligibility and exclusion criteria. Informatics analysts then mapped these criteria to existing EHR data points and build analysts developed logic to display patients who met all the criteria. Report writers created a real-time dashboard to notify DCL RNs and provide transparency to inpatient staff. Retrospective reports were also created to measure utilization trends. A DCL workgroup evaluated the effectiveness of this innovation by tracking the monthly volume of eligible patients, volume of patients sent to the lounge, and the utilization rate (UR).

Results/impact: Prior to the implementation of the DCL tool to assist with the identification of eligible patients, the DCL saw an average of 85 patients per month (January to September 2022) with an average UR of 27%. After the implementation of the DCL tool, the DCL saw an immediate increase in the daily volume of patients sent to the lounge, and a second RN was added to the DCL in late October. From October 2022 to March 2023, the DCL saw an average 331 patients per month (289% improvement) with an average UR of 58%. In April 2023, the DCL increased their operational hours to include the weekends. The average monthly volume from April to October 2023 was 999 patients per month with an average UR of 77% during that time.

Conclusions: The new build has been an important mechanism to expedite the identification of DCL appropriate patients. Although an increase in the UR and volume of patients sent to the lounge was noted in the months after its implementation, further refinement of the tool is needed to capture other patient populations. Observation patients and procedural patients are currently not identified by the electronic tool; a future next step is to improve the tool to identify these patients. In order to help staff understand patient flow and prioritize early discharges, recognition of the demand for beds due to the real-time hospital census and the need for bed availability is crucial.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P049 - Workflow Analysis: A Nursing Documentation Improvement for Highest Level of Mobility Project

Charla B. Johnson, DNP, RN, NI-BC, ONC, ANAON, Director of Nursing Informatics, Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System | Sheralyn Long, MHI, BSN, RN, NI-BC, Application System Analyst 4, Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System

Tags: informatics workflow documentation Quality mobility

Updated: 05/06/24

A core function of the nursing informaticist is to conduct workflow analysis to identify the tasks and information necessary to achieve desired outcomes. Often, operational stakeholder’s requests functionality, such as tasks or required documentation, to improve documentation compliance in the electronic medical record (EMR). The NI must observe existing workflows related to the intervention and consult with the end users on perceived barriers and adaptations to the intervention. This level of analysis allows the NI to redesign, prioritize, and order the tasks associated with the intervention to confirm the desired workflow. Ideally, a workflow analysis is done prior to intervention.

In 2022, a pilot was performed at the flagship hospital for the Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System (FMOLHS) to implement the John Hopkins activity mobility program-highest level of mobility (AMP-HLM) assessment. Activity and mobility programs have been shown to improve patient outcomes. The Epic analyst built the AMP-HLM documentation path into the systems EMR software. Following the pilot project, which included education on the tool, the AMP-HLM was rolled out operationally housewide. The overall documentation compliance and workflow integration was low. In 2023, the system chief quality officer (CQO) asked for assistance in efforts to improve documentation compliance among nurse end users using features within the EMR to aid in efficiency and prompt staff on documentation. The initial request was to add a task for the nurse as a reminder to document.

A workflow analysis was conducted by nursing informaticists in fall 2023 on three units. Three redesign interventions were identified to improve nursing AMP-HLM documentation compliance: 1) add HLM and mobility goal (AMP) to Rover to allow concurrent documentation; 2) add row information and naming with value choices for AMP, i.e., total (full assistance needed) and none (no assistance needed); and 3) add row information on the mobility scale section (flowsheets) for HLM to indicate HLM charting type (pre or post). The before and after data showed improvement for the daily AMP and the twice a day HLM documentation. Pre-daily AM-PAC overall was 46% to 64% post and pre-BID HLM was 77% to 83% post. A second redesign of two features to color code and split rows was entered into production environment with pending outcomes.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P048 - Utilization and Satisfaction with a Digital Aggregated Data Tool in Palliative Care and Hospice Clinicians

Claire T. Floyd, MSN, RN, NI-BC | Natalya Makarevich, MS, RN | Ruby Saylor, DNP, MBA, MSN, RN | Marjorie Simpson, PhD, GNP-BC, CRNP

Tags: technostress aggregate data Kardex unified theory of acceptance and use of technology

Updated: 05/06/24

Purpose: The purpose of this clinical informatics lead initiative was to adapt and evaluate the perceived effectiveness of a digital aggregated data tool (DADT) that provides comprehensive patient information as a one-page summary for inpatient palliative care (PC) and hospice clinicians.

Description: The DADT project was initiated to assist PC and hospice clinicians who reported data foraging for pre-encounter information, requiring multiple clicks in the electronic health record (EHR) and using paper and pen to take notes. According to Golz, et. al. (2021), an EHR with limited functionality increases the risk of technology overload, resulting in clinicians working faster and longer to forage patient information. This can lead to technology-related stress, known as technostress.

Many EHRs are missing a one-page summary of aggregated clinical information, similar to a traditional nursing Kardex. Presenting a DADT may revive the salient principles of the Kardex such as patient status at glance, prospective memory aid, efficiency and ease of use, real time updates, activity management, shift-to-shift handoff tool, and non-clinical communication. A group of informatics nurses met with key stakeholders from the clinical team to identify information to include on the DADT, recreating a traditional nursing Kardex. Clinicians could view the DADT or print to carry with them during patient encounters.

Evaluation: Staff utilization and satisfaction were measured as an outcome of the project using the DADT satisfaction survey (DADT-SS), a 20-item questionnaire that was developed based on the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) framework. According to the UTAUT, technology use is determined by performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, and facilitating conditions. In addition to demographic variables, the DADT-SS included open-ended questions, Likert-like responses, and scale ratings. Clinicians who received DADT training were asked to complete the DADT-SS. Analysis of the DADT-SS provided support that clinicians were extremely satisfied with the DADT, and many used it often. Some clinicians reported that using DADT decreased pre-visit preparation time.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P047 - Calling All Nurses: Opportunities Exist within Health Information Technology, Claim Your Seat!

Teresa Saxon, MS, BSN, RN | Donna Redley, MSN, RN

Tags: patient outcomes clinical decision support automation tools nurses role text classification

Updated: 05/06/24

Purpose: As health information technology (HIT) drives advancements, an opportunity exists for the largest profession in health care, nurses. Nurses are key in the HIT industry since they understand the human components a machine cannot replicate. Therefore, nurses must increase their involvement in all aspects of HIT projects spanning the entire system development life cycle (SDLC) from planning to maintenance. Additionally, by opening educational opportunities at the undergraduate level, nurses will be equipped with the skills and awareness of HIT projects from the start of their careers. This poster will discuss the importance of nursing involvement in HIT projects throughout the SDLC and raise awareness of the opportunities for nurses within HIT.

Background/significance: HIT projects are hot topics in health care. HIT projects include but are not limited to electronic health record (EHR) configuration, artificial intelligence (AI), clinical data automation, and clinical decision support (CDS) tools. While HIT has the potential to improve patient care outcomes, ease workflows, and support clinical decisions, nurses understand the clinical meaning of the free text and medical acronyms. Programmers and HIT developers need nurses’ input for multiple reasons to ensure safe HIT launches including accurate text classification, end user adoption, and conformance to regulatory standards. This poster will highlight improvements to HIT project’s successes through nursing involvement to ensure high-quality HIT project execution impacting patient care and safety outcomes.

Method(s): This quantitative study focused on testing an HIT project, a clinical data automation tool. The sample set included 3.7 million health level-7 (HL7) consolidated clinical document architecture (C-CDA) messages specific to the medication domain from October 2022 to September 2023. The testing was performed manually by a nurse as well as automatically by the clinical data automation tool. After each test, the manual and automated observations were compared.

Result(s): Initially, the clinical data automation tool had a small data repository; therefore, the text classification accuracy was +/- 18% difference compared to the manual test. However, with continued nursing involvement to refine the data repository, the text classification accuracy of the tool improved to +/- 1% difference proving more robust and efficient.

Conclusions/implications: Nursing involvement throughout testing to refine the algorithm for classification accuracy tool incontestably increased the success rate of this HIT project due to their intimate relationship with the healthcare data. Therefore, nurses, as the largest force in health care, must claim their seat at the HIT table to ensure high-quality HIT project execution for positive impacts on interoperability and patient safety.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P046 - Saving Lives: Informatics and Technology in Organ Donation

Bruce Nicely, MSN, RN, CPTC

Tags: efficiency meaningful use organ donation and transplant

Updated: 05/06/24

Purpose: Technological advances continue to affect health care in countless ways, and informatics specialists have emerged as a critical bridge between technology and clinical practice. Our purpose is to demonstrate ways in which meaningful use can be achieved when informatics specialists partner with organ procurement organizations (OPOs) to apply informatics solutions to challenges in referring, managing, and documenting the organ donation process. Beyond the capacity for meaningful analytics resulting from advanced tracking and documentation tools, those specialists can provide insight and leadership to increase efficiency.

Description: The Centers for Medicare/Medicaid Services (CMS) oversees organ donation in the United States by administering part of the National Organ Transplant Act (1984) that organizes organ donation by requiring partnership between hospitals and organ procurement organizations. Conditions of participation (COPs) issued by CMS require hospitals to make timely referral of any patient death or imminent death to their OPO to preserve the option for donation (1986). (Note that hospitals sharing patient information when making a referral is a protected consultation because OPOs are HIPAA-exempt. Pathways that link hospital electronic health records (EHR) to the OPO via the OPO EHR provider mean that required demographic and clinical data can be transmitted electronically instead of tying up a clinician on a telephone call.

We sought to build the electronic pathway from hospital to OPO to eliminate phone calls but still obtain vital information to protect the option for organ donation and remain timely. Hospital staff, often nurses in busy emergency or intensive care units, can spend ten or more minutes on the telephone provided demographic and clinical details about the referred potential donor, virtually all of which is contained within the patient’s EMR. Since OPOs are bound to the same security and privacy requirements as hospitals, we believed a secure pathway could be built to recognize certain fields or elements within the patient EMR and electronically notify the OPO when a threshold of clinical triggers was met. This not only would eliminate the clinician’s time on the phone but would also ensure accurate transmittal of required data to the OPO so they could organize the correct response. With more than 100,000 people on the US waiting list for a transplant, these referrals are the lifesaving bridge for those patients. We tapped informatics leaders to serve as champions between information technology (including system security) and clinicians to identify required data fields, build the pathways or reports that would prompt an electronic notification to the OPO, and quality check output.

Evaluation/outcome: A pilot hospital committed to the concept, and their informatics team identified subject matter experts (SME) from the EMR provider. The OPO and SME from their EMR provider joined to explain the vision, required data fields, technical pathways, and expected results. The teams met weekly throughout the project and began coding the pathway between hospital and OPO so that a new referral would appear in the OPO’s EMR platform with prompts alerting them of an urgent notification. The OPO’s remote access to the hospital EMR allowed OPO experts to review the EHR in real time, eliminating protracted phone call time for nurses or other providers. While some follow-up phone calls are required to clarify or obtain additional information, they are briefer and more focused.

Conclusion/implications: There has been a significant push to increase organ donation and transplantation in the last few years, and some have suggested that CMS should classify missed or late referrals as sentinel events. The urgency of potential organ donor referrals is associated with life or death for patients needing an organ transplant. Automated electronic referrals are an informatics solution that reduces inefficient phone calls, improves accurate clinical data transmission, and saves lives by ensuring the option for organ donation is protested and prioritized. The hospital/OPO pilot project has seen automatic referrals reach 87% timely and accurate, verified by manual review of the EHR. Expansion of automated electronic referrals can save thousands of hours of provider time and remove subjectivity from a critically important consultation from the OPO.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P045 - Revolutionizing the Approach to the System Design Life Cycle: Implementing Meaningful Patient Engagement Technology at an NCI-Designated Comprehensive Cancer Center

Lisa Baak, MSN, RN, NI-BC, Supervisor Clinical Informatics, Moffitt Cancer Center | Laura Brown, MSN, RN | Rachel Collins, BSN, RN | Timothy Demid, BSN, RN, NI-BC | Marissa Wafford, BSN, RN, NI-BC

Tags: patient engagement automated workflows system development lifecycle SDLC digital whiteboard smart hospital

Updated: 05/06/24

Purpose: Revolutionizing the partnership with end users during the system development lifecycle by developing innovative patient engagement tools that have meaningful impact on workflows and patient experiences.

Description: Patient engagement is essential to promoting optimal outcomes and meaningful patient centered care in the oncology setting. At an NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center, inpatient services were expanded with the construction of a new smart hospital that included patient engagement tools. When designed correctly, tools supporting patient engagement promote involvement in treatment and support patient-centered care. This requires thoughtful development of the technologies within the smart hospital.

Historically in the system development lifecycle, end users are consulted after conception of the initial design. Nursing informaticists at the cancer center supported the design of novel technologies by restructuring concepts of the system development lifecycle. Key stakeholders were pursued from the infancy of the project as opposed to obtaining feedback after initial technology feasibility was reviewed. This was accomplished by coordinating weekly sessions with end users to create a foundation of their expectations of the technology. Thereafter, weekly meetings transitioned to design sessions that focused on the foundation and allowed for the development of innovative products. Most importantly, engagement was not limited to clinical teams but also included patients and families. Patients are a valuable member of the multidisciplinary team as they are experts on how oncology treatments impact their quality of life. To ensure the tools impacted the continuum of care, stakeholders were empowered to design the products and utilize the informaticists as partners in the system design lifecycle.

This partnership ensured the implemented technologies integrated with the electronic medical record and supporting systems, nurse call platform, and staff announcement tool. Nurses and patients designed engagement tools, including digital whiteboards and door signs, patient education videos, clinical notifications, and daily patient tasks. One essential tool for both the patients and the clinicians was the ability to automate patient-facing displays based on modifications to the treatment plan. Formerly, nurses were responsible for a manual process that included writing updates on a whiteboard or posting a sign. The inclusive design approach leveraged digital integrations and allowed a manual workflow to become automated.

Outcome: The process of designing the patient engagement solutions was dynamic and required the stakeholders to serve as the primary experts throughout the system design lifecycle. This was particularly important when reviewing automation workflows. Workflow automation should be developed to promote patient experience and remove administrative duties from the clinical workflow. As a result of the partnership developed, patient satisfaction surveys have been positive with feedback supporting the use of the tools created. Furthermore, clinical leadership and representation from the patients have expressed their support of continued early engagement when developing tools that impact experience. This suggests that stakeholders should be approached as early-on collaborative partners in the system design lifecycle to ensure product development meet the needs of patient-centered care.

Marissa Wafford discloses that she is a project manager of healthcare services for physIQ.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.

P043 - Streamlining Instructional Technology in a College of Nursing

Sharon Giarrizzo-Wilson, PhD, RN, NI-BC, CNOR, FAAN, Clinical Analyst, Empiric Health

Tags: education technology

Updated: 05/06/24

Background: Nursing education relies on the application of health technologies to facilitate the development of student knowledge and clinically competent skills. The associated integration of advanced instructional technology has led to the evolution in learning modalities, pedagogical foundations, faculty responsibilities, and learning outcomes. Coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic, the long-term role of digital technologies have entrenched nursing education.

Purpose: The college of nursing identified a need for a centralized decision-making structure to provide faculty with a forum to address instructional technology needs and requests. The shared governance process raises awareness of coexisting resource, reduces duplication of similar technology solutions, establish a mechanism to facilitate section and need for new technology, and achieves consensus through multistakeholder discussions.

Methods: The dean established an educational technology (ET) committee representing each nursing specialty program, faculty support group, finance, and information technology departments for the inaugural year. The specialty director of the healthcare informatics program and the lead instructional design specialist were appointed co-chairs. The committee meets monthly to establish a standardized process, identify deliverables, and vet faculty requests for education software and technologies.

Results: The inaugural year deliverables included the creation of a committee charter, an evolving ET request workflow, electronic ET request form, and a digital product integration board. A total of 9 faculty requests were submitted with 3 requests approved with funding, 2 approved with grant funding or without fees, 1 approved without funding, and 3 pending reviews.

Limitations: The ET committee does not have a budget to fund instructional technology requests. The executive committee determines whether a request will be funded based on the number of nursing specialty programs interested in the technology.

Conclusions: The ET committee provides an important service for the college of nursing. Persistence of the committee continues and funding options are under consideration.

Learning outcome: Participants will gain an understanding of the requirements and challenges to standardize education technologies for nursing academic programing.

Learning Objective:

After completing this learning activity, the participant will be able to assess innovations being used by other professionals in the specialty and evaluate the potential of implementing the improvements into practice.