Chapter 9: Virtual Nursing – Scope and Opportunity

The Impact of Virtual Nursing on Patient and Nurse Satisfaction

The next few years are poised to see significant advancements in virtual nursing and artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare. Experts predict that, similar to the widespread adoption of electronic health records (EHRs), virtual nursing will become a standard part of care delivery.

Increased Interest and Opportunities

As virtual nursing becomes more prevalent, nurses will increasingly seek to understand and engage with this innovative practice. This growing interest could lead to new career paths that extend beyond traditional hospital roles.

Enhancing Patient and Nurse Satisfaction

Integrating AI technologies into every patient room can improve care and provide reassurance for nurses, contributing to job satisfaction. As healthcare organizations recognize the value of virtual nursing, it may become a crucial tool for recruitment and retention.

Conclusion

In summary, the future of virtual nursing and AI holds great promise for improving patient care and enhancing the nursing profession. As we embrace these changes, we move closer to a healthcare system that prioritizes both patient outcomes and nurse satisfaction

Listen to Holly Lorenz, Narinder Singh, and Tiffany Wyatt explore the scope and opportunity of virtual nursing.

 

Video Transcript

Narinder Singh:

Great. I wish we could almost end there. It’s such a great message and I think we’ve done this a little bit on the peer reviewed for presentations on the AI at a very tactical level. It’s one of the things that we really believe in makes a difference for this, but I think you’re taking it up a level of saying like, look, we need to really show evidence for these things so that we can establish best practices and minimally for that, not just so it’s not a marketing thing for companies, it’s a real kind of transformation of care things for hospitals. I want to zoom out and I’ll ask both of you this question. I’ll start with Holly. She’s our guest, is Holly prediction time. Three years from now, where do you think we’re going to be at with virtual nursing and some of the AI things that we look, are those step two or are those necessary for us to even get beyond the pilot phase with step one? How do you think about the next three years of virtual nursing? And I’ll let Tiffany chime in after that as well.

Holly Lorenz:

So I think three years is still going to be a large part of learning and then some additional adoption because I think it is going to take a while for us to really get to a point where it’s standard of care. That was the same thing that happened with electronic health records. There are now the majority of the workforce has never worked without an electronic health record. I predict we’re going to get to that same point with virtual nursing. The majority of the workforce will never have worked without a virtual nurse,

Tiffany Wyatt:

And I have to agree with that. I don’t think also that that will be in the next three to five years. But I do agree also there’s going to be a lot more adoption people interested in wanting to learn about virtual nursing. I think on the nursing side as well, nurses are going to start to be a lot more interested in virtual nursing and what is this? Because it has pretty much, if you’re have been a nurse, you have a couple tracks and they’re mostly in the hospital. So this I think will also gain interest in the next couple of years from nurses wanting to learn about virtual nursing and be a virtual nurse. I think that also people are going to realize that the impact to make a huge impact, you really do need that device in every room to get those AI or at least on a unit.

And I think certain vendors will also understand we need to support the hospitals with their needs. And I am proud that look deep does that. And I know because we do that every day, but we have to start with the patients. What do the patients need? How can we improve the care and really listen to the nurses like Holly has said. So I think that’s where we see in the next three to five years is a lot more people being interested in it, a lot more adoption, a lot more people starting to look at best practices, not even getting there yet, but starting to say, what can we really do to make this an impact to the patients and the nurses?

Holly Lorenz:

Stephanie, I actually think in five years we are going to see that nurses are determining where they want to work because someone has virtual nursing. It will be a recruitment and a retention tool because it’s a nurse satisfaction aspect.

Tiffany Wyatt:

And I think that I agree with you completely that we’ve had done it a couple times, but that safety side, I think that has huge capacity for virtual nursing, but just for having that device in every room to have those eyes to know that you’re having someone watch you to know that the hospital has your back on that. I think that will also be a retention and a recruitment.