oa Perception of emergency nurses on electronic health record (Cerner) in acute-care setting

Background: The introduction of electronic health record (Cerner) in Qatar's public health system aimed to bridge the disparities in documenting patient's official health record. It is essential to recognize nurses' viewpoint in using this technology. As it embarks on the two emergency walk-in-clinics, we attempted to identify its impact to ER nurses in terms of coordination of care, documentation skills and staff productivity.

Methods: The study is conducted in 2 Walk-in Clinics under Hamad General Hospital- Emergency Department, namely Al Gharaffa and Al Shahaniya. Questionnaires were given to a convenience sample of emergency nurses, asking about new opportunities EHRs created in work outcomes in the 2 walk-in-clinics. A 3-point Likert-type scale was used for the survey. Results were dichotomized (respondents indicated that they agree, neutral or disagree) for analysis.

Results: More than half of the respondents (68.4%) worked in HMC for more than 10 years. Nurses believed that the use of electronic health records enable them to streamline the patient flow in the walk-in-clinics (92% reported better coordination of care). Most nurses agreed that their productivity increased after using EHR increased after using EHR. Likewise, most of the nurses (96%), expressed that accessibility to patient's health record and that their documentation skills improved.

Conclusion: The introduction of electronic health record (Cerner) has a positive impact to emergency nurses. It is possible that after a year of use, the perception to EHR use will change. As such, this study may assist in determining if the system is meeting the expectation of emergency nurses in Qatar.