Wk3/dis/reply ybr

The American Medical Informatics Association(AMIA,2011) defines informatics as the science of how to use data, information and knowledge to improve human health and delivery of health care services. The nurse informatics specialist serves as a bridge in between the technological part of patient care and the clinicians providing the care. Nursing informatics is a combination of nursing science and data management, analyzation, and communication. This means that the nurse informatics specialist contributes to every aspect of the patient care from the moment he is triaged in the emergency room right to the moment that he or she is discharged from the hospital and has a follow up with his or hers primary care clinician, just to give an example. The goal of the nurse informatics specialist is to improve efficiency of care, lower the cost of care and enhance the quality of care. 

I learned that often times the nurse informatics specialists starts off by being assigned to an IT committee or a special project in the unit that they work for as extra work and then a genuine interest ignites to get certified as a nurse informatics specialist. There are various ways that a nurse can obtain certification. The American Nurses Credentialing Center(ANCC) provides a competence-based certification through examination to licensed registered nurses, that meet specific requirements. This certification is valid for five years and the RN can continue using this credential by maintaining a valid RN license and meeting renewal requirements. There is also a masters degree that the RN can pursue and it can take 18 to 24 months to complete. Not necessarily you have credentials to be working as a nurse informatics specialist. The years and the type of experience in the field are also put into account when one is being considered to fill this position. 

This is an ever-growing aspect of health care in this day and age and consequently the demand for the nursing informatics specialist is increasing as well. The AMIA predicts that in the next five years approximately 70,000 informatics specialists are going to be needed in the American health care system.