The Unique Contributions DNP-Prepared Nurses Bring to Health Informatics

Nursing informatics integrates nursing science, computer science, and information science to manage knowledge in nursing and draw meaningful insights from collating and analyzing patient data. The significant role nursing informatics plays in any healthcare environment cannot be overlooked, nor can the need for doctoral-level nursing leaders in this rapidly growing field.

Nursing informatics continues its forward progress in hospitals and other healthcare settings, thanks to initiatives led by agencies like the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which developed a program encouraging eligible hospitals and critical care access hospitals to adopt, implement, upgrade, and/or demonstrate certified electronic health record technology. These types of major IT initiatives require skilled nurse leaders who can lead teams and make meaningful contributions to ensuring patients receive safe and effective care.

As data analytics now drive decision-making at the system, organizational and clinical level, nurses educated in health informatics through a practice-focused DNP have become integral to reducing costs, ensuring safety and improving patient outcomes.

DNP-Prepared Nurse Informaticists are Critical to Integrating Technology

The Doctor of Nursing Practice in health informatics prepares students for senior positions in an informatics role in any patient care setting large enough to manage large data sets. The Chief Nursing Informatics Officer (CNIO), the chief clinical information officer, the vice president of clinical informatics, and similar roles are becoming key positions in hospitals, integrated health systems and managed care organizations throughout the country.

Informatics nurses educated at the doctoral level are able to address the many healthcare reform initiatives that require patient care organizations to better coordinate care across the continuum, improve patient safety, and better document how care is delivered.