Enhancing Nursing Practice: Bridging the Knowledge Gaps in Precision Health

Purpose: Precision health (PH) is a cutting-edge healthcare strategy that tailors treatments to the unique characteristics of each person. These individual characteristics include data from testing and analysis of genetics, genomics, and other omics, such as proteomics, metabolomics, and microbiomics, as well as data generated from wearable devices, direct-to¬ consumer testing, patient-derived health data, social determinants of health (SDOH), and health literacy. PH has the potential to improve individual well-being while improving health equity.

Despite its potential benefits, there exists a notable lack of confidence and knowledge in PH, particularly within the nursing community. This deficiency can be attributed to the absence of a consistent definition and variability in educational approaches. A literature review confirmed a general lack of available competencies in PH, while a subsequent pilot study assessing nurses' PH knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSA), conveyed that nurses feel discomfort with their own level of knowledge and skills related to PH. However, nurses strongly recognized the need to incorporate PH data into plans of care and treatment options.

Description: The journey towards building confidence and expertise in PH begins with nurses taking ownership of the process and developing standardized PH definitions and education. To address this gap, the American Nurses Association convened a workgroup of experts to produce nursing competencies in PH. These competencies will guide nursing educators in curriculum development for nurses. Nurse informaticists must familiarize themselves with the developed competencies along with the principles and practices of PH; design electronic health records (EHRs) that enable the accurate documentation of SDoH, genetic testing data, and other sources of health data provided by direct individual patient reporting; and facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration to ensure regulatory compliance and patient privacy.

Evaluation/outcome: Informatics nurses have a pivotal role in integrating PH data into technological solutions. Becoming familiar with the developed nursing competencies will help them ensure usability and accessibility of PH data. Beyond designing EHRs to enable the accurate documentation of PH data, the informatics nurse must look at PH through the lens of technology and imagine the potential.

Learning outcome: Define precision health.