Computer Caregivers Will Revolutionize Patient Care

Computer Caregivers Will Revolutionize Patient Care

A registered nurse hopes for computer caregivers that will improve patient care and the public health, cut health care costs, and maybe even change the world!

By Emmie McGuire

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012 Emmie McGuire

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Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work

of this author.

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Dedication

To the visionaries who will explore these horizons

To my husband, whom I love

And for patients, who deserve the best

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Author’s Note to Readers

I’m an RN and fairly knowledgeable about nursing practice and many current, emerging, and even theoretical computer advances. But I’m not an expert, since I learned much of what I write about from my education and experience more years ago than I’d like to admit; from popular media such as TV, radio, magazines, and online journalism; from speakers at health care conferences; and from informal conversations with friends, family and colleagues experienced in health care or computer science. So this is my informed opinion, shared in the hopes it will be a catalyst for change, in the hopes that health care and computer students and professionals will read it and consider working together to create Computer Caregivers and other related technology, and in the hopes that they will receive the support they’ll need for that exciting, and revolutionary, exploration.

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Table of Contents

Preface: Embracing Change for Patient-Centered Care

Introduction

Part I: The Patient Care Team Today: Education, Experience, and Empathy

Chapter 1: Education and Experience

Chapter 2: Empathy

Chapter 3: Continuity of Care

Chapter 4: The RN’s Role

Part II: Patient Assessment and Education

Chapter 5: The Assessment Process

Chapter 6: Patient Assessment Errors

Chapter 7: Judgment in Patient Assessment

Chapter 8: Patient Education

Part III: The Computer in Health Care Today

Chapter 9: Administrative (and Clinical) Systems

Chapter 10: Computers in Patient Tests and Treatments

Chapter 11: Computers in Patient Monitoring

Chapter 12: Mobile Medicine

Chapter 13: Assessment Triage

Chapter 14: The EHR

Chapter 15: Computers in Education

Chapter 16: Data Analysis

Part IV: Emerging Computer Capacities in Artificial Intelligence

Chapter 17: How Computers Think

Chapter 18: Data Mining

Chapter 19: Human-Computer Interaction

Chapter 20: Beyond Human-Computer Interaction

Part V: The New Patient Care Team

Chapter 21: A Hypothetical Patient Encounter- Carey

Chapter 22: Carey’s Development Process

Chapter 23: Carey and Communication

Chapter 24: Carey and the Formal Assessment

Chapter 25: Carey and Patient Education

Chapter 26: Today’s (Real) Next Steps

Chapter 27: What can you do?

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Preface: Embracing Change for Patient-Centered Care

Computer Caregivers will revolutionize patient care, improve the public health, and cut health care costs by replacing registered nurses (RNs) on many direct patient care teams. RNs are already being phased out of many of these teams as a cost-cutting measure, now replaced with less expensive but less educated and experienced human staff. If these RNs are replaced instead with computers that have abilities that match or even surpass the RN’s skills, patient care teams comprised of human and computer caregivers will transform health care.

Society will need to re-direct resources, particularly money and minds, away from current well-intentioned but misguided efforts to shore up the role of the patient care RN and toward the development of computer caregivers. Instead of spending millions to recruit and educate RNs with promises of personal and professional fulfillment as patient caregivers, when in fact most RNs are now typically removed from hands on direct patient care, those funds could support the development of patient care teams comprised of human and computer caregivers.

A computer can’t possibly do what I do is a refrain that has been heard, and proven wrong, in countless fields, including medicine. I know it may be many RNs’ first thought because I am an RN and it was my first thought when I began to research this. Nursing has long been among the most trusted professions, and we have been highly valued for our unique blend of knowledge, judgment, skills, and compassion. However, I quickly learned that computers already perform many tasks I’ve performed as an RN and might be able to surpass many of our abilities, if research and development is properly supported. Any shortcomings, such as the tremendous comfort patients feel from the gentle touch of a human hand, can be addressed by the human members of the patient care team.

Nurses will ultimately embrace this revolution. Our first priority has always been our patients and once convinced that computer caregivers will benefit our patients and the public health, we will advocate for the finest computers possible, integrated into patient care teams that will offer the finest patient care possible.

What will become of RNs? Certainly, there will continue to be important roles for RNs in areas other than direct patient care- such as in hospital leadership, medical and nursing research, public health policy development and implementation, and so on. Some RNs will continue to function for some time as part of direct patient care teams, particularly in health care systems that are slow to adopt new technologies. Even in more progressive systems, RNs will need to mentor computer caregivers, particularly as the first generations of computer caregivers are integrated into patient care teams. This mentoring process has already begun to some degree, since nurses’ feedback has been instrumental in improving algorithms in the computerized patient assessment