Researching nurses’ use of digital technology during the COVID-19 pandemic
Intended for healthcare professionals
Evidence and practice    

Researching nurses’ use of digital technology during the COVID-19 pandemic

Dawn Dowding Professor in clinical decision making/directorate lead for adult nursing/health, Division of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, The University of Manchester, Manchester, England
Sarah Skyrme Research associate, Centre for Epidemiology Versus Arthritis, Division of Musculoskeletal and Dermatological Sciences, Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, The University of Manchester, Manchester, England
Rebecca Randell Professor of digital innovations in healthcare, faculty of health studies, University of Bradford, Bradford, England
Louise Newbould Research fellow, Department For Social Policy And Social Work, University of York, York, England
Muhammad Faisal Senior research fellow in biostatistics, Faculty of Health Studies, University of Bradford, Bradford, England
Nick Hardiker Dean, School of Human And Health Sciences, University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield, England

Why you should read this article:
  • To understand some of the reasons why digital technology in healthcare can be challenging for nurses to use in practice

  • To learn about the various types of digital technology used by nurses during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic

  • To appreciate the factors that affected nurses’ use of digital technology during the COVID-19 pandemic

The adoption of digital technology by nurses accelerated during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. However, not all nurses were familiar with the various digital systems used in their organisations and there were reports of digital technology not being fit for purpose. This article describes a service evaluation that used an online survey to obtain nurses’ feedback on the digital systems used to support patient care during the pandemic. Fifty-five respondents provided details about 85 separate digital systems. The usability of these systems varied significantly across technology types, while barriers to their use included nurses’ lack of digital literacy and inadequate access to IT infrastructure. However, most of the nurse respondents felt that digital technology had supported effective patient care during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nursing Standard. doi: 10.7748/ns.2023.e12013

Peer review

This article has been subject to external double-blind peer review and checked for plagiarism using automated software

@decisiondawn

Correspondence

dawn.dowding@manchester.ac.uk

Dowding D, Skyrme S, Randell R et al (2023) Researching nurses’ use of digital technology during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nursing Standard. doi: 10.7748/ns.2023.e12013

Acknowledgement

We would like to acknowledge the Burdett Trust for Nursing, and the contribution of Angela Reed and Manoj Mistry in the design of this study and reporting of the findings

Published online: 09 May 2023

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