Telehealth and Technology in Health Care
Did you know that the average smartphone user touches his or her phone 2,617 times in a day? In this age of smartphones, the Internet, and social media, modern technology has invaded practically all facets of our lives. It has made life a lot easier and more fun for people that it’s literally everywhere, and nurses are no exception.
The nursing practice, just like any other undertaking, is also shaped by the challenges of the times. With the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic worldwide, nursing clinical routines have also experienced radical changes. And though some of the transformations were already being developed years prior to the pandemic, the recent crisis has surely accelerated its progress.
An example of this are developments in the field of communication, an important element in nursing best practices (The University of Rhode Island, 2017). The handover process, which is vital to patient care, greatly benefits from innovations in communications technology since the accuracy of messages between sender and receiver is ensured via voice recording. Traditional verbal communication, with KARDEX and the note-taking process as reference, are known for certain setbacks especially when undertaken by the incoming nurse. Voice or audio recording has certainly enhanced its quality.
Paper based records have likewise been replaced by paperless processes, therefore bringing us to the age of paperless nursing. Medical records can now be accessed through a software that hospitals have installed to the computers and tablets at the station and computers on wheels (COW) at the bedside. This has made information readily available to the entire healthcare team, with dedicated dashboards to each user to ensure the confidentiality of patients’ records. Advanced practitioner nurses have also been relying on regular phone brigades and video conferences to monitor their patients. This is highly advantageous to chronically ill and stable patients, as check-ups can now be accomplished without requiring both parties to meet in person. All of the above changes fall under the umbrella of telehealth and technology in healthcare, which helped ensure the efficiency of healthcare services despite the pandemic. Nurses, however, will find that telehealth and technology in healthcare tend to be far more advanced in the big tertiary hospitals and healthcare institutions overseas. If you are a nurse who’s currently looking for one, then we invite you to apply to any of our job vacancies. As the number 1 deployer of healthcare workers among all Philippine-based recruitment agencies, we assure you that we’ve carefully selected our overseas employers to ensure that Filipino nurses will simply get the best opportunities.
To apply, you may visit our Facebook Page or our job portal. If you want us to do a quick screening of your resume, then you may send it to recruitment@abba.ph. We hope to be able to bring you to an overseas hospital or healthcare institution with the advanced telehealth and technology in healthcare that you’ve been pining for!