Compassion Meets the Computer Age

Compassion Meets the Computer Age According to Roy Simpson's 2001 article from Nursing Management "Compassion meets the computer age," nurses can take heart: one of the most vital functions they perform can never be done via the computer, namely the ability to show compassion for a patient in need. The article presents a balanced perspective of the role of technology in modern nursing.

On one hand, telemetry and point-of-care systems have enabled nurses to function more efficiently, and to devote their precious time to caring for patients, not to documentation or monitoring vital signs. On the other hand, computers and recording computer data can often be used as a way of avoiding real patient contact (Simpson 2001, p.14). During my clinical days at St. Mary's, I often witnessed this truth, given the increased amount of information that is available on patients through computer record-keeping.

Quite often, nurses would have the attitude that they 'knew' the patient, simply based upon reading the patient's electronically recorded history, before meeting the patient face-to-face and taking the patient's emotional temperature. A patient with a long history of psychological illnesses like anxiety of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) would be taken less seriously when they spoke about their distress than someone with no such history, for example.

Also, manifesting certain illnesses, like diabetes or lung cancer that indicated negative lifestyle choices could make nurses less compassionate towards the patient, even before they met the individual. In reaction, I tried not to let preexisting knowledge inform my judgment of the character of the individual patient, and tried to be mindful to separate the illness from the person, especially when I did not know the individual other than in terms of computer-recorded data.

While reading this article, it struck me that there are two fundamentally different types of technology used in medicine today -- there is technology that distances the patient from the caretaker, and technology that increases the contact between the nurse and patient. At its most extreme, the type of technology that is most distancing is the type of automated voice phone system that is the first point of contact for many patients between themselves and their insurance companies.

I have witnessed patients waiting to discover if a procedure is covered, if a doctor is in-network, or an answer as to what laboratory their blood work should be sent. Other technologies, like electronic recordkeeping can be helpful, but can also distance the nurse from the patient if it is used as a substitute for thorough face-to-face interviews. And some technologies can bring nurse and patient closer together, like those that facilitate efficiency or enable the patient to contact a healthcare provider while being cared for at home.

One of the reasons I have chosen a career in nursing is that I do not feel comfortable making a living behind a computer, and not doing hands-on work of consequence. Nurses must be careful not to behave as if compassion can be outsourced, given that so much of modern life, from cell phones to the Internet, creates such an impression. Even during the best of circumstances, a great.