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PATH The


toward a career in nursing informatics By Robin Farmer T


he career pathway to nursing informatics, which leverages technology by combining nursing skills with science and data management, might be closer than you think.


Bedside nurses can get started by getting involved with their


organization’s initiatives in IT that include the clinical arena, said nurses who already work in informatics. Volunteering as a super-user for electronic health records projects is another route to take on more of an informatics role. Super-users, individuals trained to serve as resource people in


their practice areas, “become sort of an informatics leader in their work area and act as a liaison to the informatics teamfor any new initiatives,” said Ellen Pollack,MSN,RN, chief nursing informat- ics officer, UCLA Health, Los Angeles. “It gives them the ability to get inside the inner circle and gives them the experience that can then allow them to get a position as nursing informaticists.” Pollack also recommended nurses attend conferences, such as


the ones offered by theAmericanNursing Informatics Association to network and learn more about the field. Michelle Lardner,MS, RN-BC, director of nursing informatics


at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, Va., agrees that working as a super-user is a great entry point. “When I get resumes and people apply to my department that is one of the things I look for,” Lardner said. “If you have no experience, are you at least a super-us- er? Because that to me shows you are engaged, this is of interest to you and you want to be involved with all things informatics.” Her interest with informatics deepened when she was doing


performance improvement while working as a med/surg nurse, Lardner said. “I was tasked with reviewing and auditing the charts of theEMR for specific quality initiatives for the hospital and putting together the statistics around that specifically for my unit and reporting that tomy supervisor,” she said. “Having done that, I got to be really intimate with where to find everything in the medical records, not just the stuff I needed to do, but what other people documented. So I saw the value in ‘Oh, wouldn’t it be great to be able to change some of this because it would be easier to do it this way.’ And then I gotmy master’s in informatics around that same time.”


18 NURSE.com/Careers • 2016 Manymed/surg and other direct-care nurses interested in infor-


matics roles start gaining experience though peer leadership oppor- tunities, such as nursing shared governance as well as volunteering as a super-user forEHRprojects, saidMichelleDardis,MSN,MBA, RN-BC, associate project director, eClinical,Division ofHealthcare Evaluation, The Joint Commission. “As hospitals mature in their EHR use, opportunities may


change fromsupporting big implementations, such as CPOE, to assisting with clinical documentation tracers, new hire orientation, and other roles supporting the use of theEHR,” saidDardis,who is responsible for developing electronic clinical qualitymeasures. As the field grows and the visibility of informaticists in both


clinical and business settings increases, experts say it is important that nurses entering the field possess the knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary to further promote the value of the nurse informaticist. Nurses who want to advance in the world of infor- matics should seek a master’s degree or certification. Specialized trainingwill help nurses in their roles as super-user


and assist themwith training their peers. And being educated can help these nurses understand howtheir systems need to be set up, said Patricia C. Dykes, PhD, RN, FAAN, FACMI, an American Medical Informatics Association board member. “Nurses make really great informaticists because they under-


stand work flow,” said Dykes, senior nurse scientist, program director of the Center for Patient Safety Research and Practice, and programdirector of the Center forNursing Excellence at Brigham andWomen’sHospital. “They are very often at the center of patient care. They interact with the patient and they interact with all of the different disciplines. They do have optimal experience that can really benefit an implementation of a rollout or their role as super-user. Additional informatics training is important, too.” Dardis agreed. Certification establishes a baseline com-


petency in the knowledge necessary to be successful in the field, she said. •


Robin Farmer is a freelance writer. TO COMMENT, email editor@nurse.


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