Healthcare Practitioner and Technology Discussion

One technological advance I see in my place of business is a monitor that is placed under the mattress of the client to remotely monitor their heart rate, respirations and sleep quality during the night. This was created by a company in Israel called Early Sense and has been used increasingly throughout the world with an explosion in growth surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic (COVID-19 Patients, 2020). This is useful because the eating disorder population has electrolyte imbalances which affect cardiac functioning. They also have sleep disturbances as a result of starvation. We can watch their heart rates rise and their sleep quality improve once they begin to regularly nourish themselves.

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I see several benefits associated with the use of these Early Sense monitors. The first being the ability to detect hidden infections in our clients even before they may experience symptoms. When the body is starving, the vitals trend downward because the body is desperately trying to conserve energy. This results in a low heart rate, lower respirations and a lower temperature. As these are the very measurements that increase in a body fighting infection, these clients may have vitals within normal limits for the population at large, but may in fact be an indication that their body is fighting an infection. Another benefit which companies are exploring to take the data on vitals signs farther is to add them to a data base which all providers could access once the client leaves the inpatient facility and heads to their outpatient provider (Pereira et al., 2016). A potential risk associated with this data technology is more difficult to find. I suppose a risk could be that the vital readings could be shared with people who are not supposed to have access to it. I still believe this risk to be far overshadowed by the benefits of this technology for the safety of our population.

The healthcare technology trend I believe is the most promising for impacting healthcare technology in nursing practice is social media and mobile applications. Firstly, they are accessible by most everyone in the general population. They are native to phone applications now which means not only are they accessible, they are easy to be used and in everyone’s back pockets. I believe these will readily impact improvements in patient care outcomes because patients will hopefully be adding their diagnosis to their health apps along with their current medications. Taking these lists to the doctor with them will result in the provider having a better clinical picture and giving a better diagnosis. Also, as these resources grow, the providers will be able to recommend the best apps for the needs of their specific clients (Skiba, 2017).

COVID-19 Patients Cared for Using EarlySense’s Contact-free Continuous Monitoring Solution at Leading Hospital in the Netherlands. (2020). Medical Letter on the CDC & FDA.

Pereira, A., Portela, F., Santos, M. F., Machado, J., & Abelha, A. (2016). Pervasive Business Intelligence: A New Trend in Critical Healthcare. Procedia Computer Science, 98, 362–367. https://doi-org.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/10.1016/j.p…

Skiba, D. (2017). Evaluation tools to appraise social media and mobile applications. Informatics, 4(3), 32–40. doi:10.3390/informatics4030032

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RE: Discussion – Week 6

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