Digital skills 'fundamental' for frontline nurses to deliver safe and effective care, says Walsall nursing chief
A chief nurse has spoken of the need to ensure the next generation of nurses is 'digitally ready'.
It comes as there are plans to expand the use of 'virtual wards' in the Black Country, where patients with certain conditions can receive care in their own home through video calls and tech devices to help them self-monitor and remotely report back their own vitals.
Professor Ann-Marie Cannaby, who is chief nurse at Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs Manor Hospital, said virtual approaches to healthcare at-scale are still relatively new for the nursing profession.
"Equipping the modern nursing workforce for the realities it faces using new technologies to enhance access requires new thinking around education," she said.
"Virtual consultations and virtual wards have spread rapidly in the NHS since the Covid-19 pandemic.
"They have become a progressively important means to providing access to increasingly in-demand services.
"As the NHS continues to deal with growing backlogs and other strains on its services, this is about enabling healthcare professionals to monitor and oversee more patients, while also allowing individuals to best maintain their independence."
She said digital skills were "fundamental" for frontline nurses to deliver safe and effective care and emphasised the need to produce modules for nurses in undergraduate courses that prepare them for the technology they will use.
"Clinicians at the frontline need to work with technology providers to co-create and design the future of care," she added.
"How we assess and care for people virtually brings a whole new set of challenges.
"Nurses are trained to observe changes in a person’s recovery – or deterioration – based on physical interaction and often have therapeutic relationships developed in proximity.
"The question of how we overcome lessened social interaction and the face-to-face contact is a significant one.
"How do nurses pick up on cues from patients in a virtual or remote environment?
"How do we overcome a potentially lessened ability to physically look and listen in virtual care environments that can be more formal? These are questions we need to address."
She said core areas that need to be considered in undergraduate education and by healthcare providers included training and educating students with different digital technologies and providing opportunities for nurses to combine technology with their knowledge and practice.
She added: "Importantly, we need to encourage curiosity for innovation – creating a culture where nurses are excited to review technologies of the future and understand the application of technologies within healthcare."
