Study of Sharing Patient Information by Nurses Between Inpatient and Outpatient Wards in Japan.

Shortening hospital stays increases communication needs between nurses in inpatient and outpatient wards. Smooth information sharing is required to reduce the workload of nurses and improve the quality of patient care. However, electronic medical records (EMR) system does not have sufficient functions to support information sharing between wards, because EMR has been developed mainly for recording. This study led to three improvements; unified communication tool, common patient list linked to EMR, and outpatient nursing diagnosis.