ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Reports on the impact of electronic medical record (EMR) systems on clinicians are mixed. Currently, nurses' experiences of adopting a large-scale, multisite EMR system have not been investigated. Nurses are the largest health care workforce; therefore, the impact of EMR implementation must be investigated and understood to ensure that patient care quality, changes to nurses' work, and nurses themselves are not negatively impacted. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to explore Australian nurses' postimplementation experiences of an organization-wide EMR system. METHODS: This qualitative descriptive study used focus group and individual interviews and an open-ended survey question to collect data between 12 and 18 months after the implementation of an EMR across 6 hospital sites of a large health care organization in Victoria, Australia. Data were collected between November 2020 and June 2021, coinciding with the COVID-19 pandemic. Analysis comprised complementary inductive and deductive approaches. Specifically, reflexive thematic analysis was followed by framework analysis by the coding of data as barriers or facilitators to nurses' use of the EMR using the Theoretical Domains Framework. RESULTS: A total of 158 nurses participated in this study. The EMR implementation dramatically changed nurses' work and how they viewed their profession, and nurses were still adapting to the EMR implementation 18 months after implementation. Reflexive thematic analysis led to the development of 2 themes: An unintentional divide captured nurses' feelings of division related to how using the EMR affected nurses, patient care, and the broader nursing profession. This time, it's personal detailed nurses' beliefs about the EMR implementation leading to bigger changes to nurses as individuals and nursing as a profession than other changes that nurses have experienced within the health care organization. The most frequent barriers to EMR use by nurses were related to the Theoretical Domains Framework domain of environmental context and resources. Facilitators of EMR use were most often related to memory, attention, and decision processes. Most barriers and facilitators were related to motivation. CONCLUSIONS: Nurses perceived EMR implementation to have a mixed impact on the provision of quality patient care and on their colleagues. Implementing technology in a health care setting was perceived as a complex endeavor that impacted nurses' perceptions of their autonomy, ways of working, and professional roles. Potential negative consequences were related to nursing workforce retention and patient care delivery. Motivation was the main behavioral driver for nurses' adoption of EMR systems and hence a key consideration for implementing interventions or organizational changes directed at nurses.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: The impacts of electronic medical record implementation on nurses, the largest healthcare workforce, have not been comprehensively examined. Negative impacts on nurses have implications for quality of patient care delivery and workforce retention. OBJECTIVE: To investigate changes in nurses' well-being, intention to stay, burnout, work engagement, satisfaction, motivation and experience using technology pre- and post-implementation of an organisation-wide electronic medical record in Victoria, Australia. METHODS: The natural experiment comprised an electronic medical record system implementation across six hospitals of a large tertiary healthcare organisation. Cross-sectional surveys were collected pre-electronic medical record implementation prior to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in 2019, and 18-months post-electronic medical record implementation during the pandemic in 2020, and findings compared. RESULTS: A total of 942 surveys were analysed (550 pre-electronic medical record (response rate 15.52%) and 392 post-electronic medical record (response rate 9.50%)). Post-electronic medical record, nurses' work satisfaction (r = 0.23, p=<0.001), intention to stay (r = 0.11, p = 0.001) and well-being (r = 0.17, p=<0.001) decreased. Nurses' perceived competence increased (r = 0.10, p = 0.002) despite decreased autonomy (r = 0.10, p = 0.003). Two of three dimensions of work engagement worsened (vigour r = 0.13, p=<0.001; dedication r = 0.13, p=<0.001) and all dimensions of burnout increased (exhaustion r = 0.08, p = 0.012, cynicism r = 0.07, p = 0.04 and reduced efficiency r = 0.32, p=<0.001). Nurses reported more burnout symptoms (95% CI 4.6-4.7%, p = 0.036), were less engaged (95% CI 49.6-49.9%, p=<0.001) and career trajectory satisfaction decreased (r = 0.15, p=<0.001). Matched data from 52 nurses showed changes in the same direction for all items except career trajectory satisfaction, hence validated findings from the larger unmatched sample. CONCLUSIONS: Implementation of an electronic medical record immediately followed by the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic was associated with negative changes in nurses' well-being, intention to stay, burnout, work engagement and satisfaction.