Telehealth as ‘Disruptive Innovation’ in Nursing
A patient uses telehealth equipment to communicate with his nurse. Photo courtesy of Janet Grady.
“Telehealth: A Case Study in Disruptive Innovation” is a CE article in AJN‘s April issue. The author, Janet Grady, vice president of academic affairs and chair of the Nursing and Health Sciences Division at the University of Pittsburgh in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, describes the concept of disruptive innovations in nursing and delves into the evolving field of telehealth as a current example.
The article considers the following:
- uses and potential uses of telehealth in chronic and acute care, home care, and rural medicine, and the evidence supporting its use.
- obstacles to wider use and acceptance of telehealth, which include cultural resistance within nursing, licensure issues across states, reimbursement challenges, and the need to adapt nursing curriculum to these new ways of delivering care.
- forces that drive or obstruct disruptive innovations like telehealth.
Here’s the article overview:
Technologic advances in health care have often outpaced our ability to integrate the technology efficiently, establish best practices for its use, and develop policies to regulate and evaluate its effectiveness. However, these may be insufficient reasons to put the brakes on innovation—particularly those “disruptive innovations” that challenge […]