Information Technology and Decision Making

Patient safety and care is reliant upon the quality of nurses' daily decision making. Nurses are constantly tending to the needs of multiple patients by providing health care information, administering drug treatments, managing patient family concerns, as well as informing other nurses and staff on the patient's condition.

Review your reading from this week and then address the following:

1. Explain how well your current work setting supports you and your colleagues in decision making.

2. Share your thoughts on two ways that electronic or computerized information technology could help you and your nursing colleagues improve decision making in your work setting. You can include decision support applications or not, as you wish.

Support your ideas or those of others with references from the professional nursing literature.