The evaluation will allow Nurse Maude to understand what it can do to support staff with regard to any additional training requirements and understand the usability of the system. It will also provide information which will enhance implementation of future large change management projects.
Nurse Maude is the largest home-based support provider in Canterbury, providing services to a mostly older population, through district nursing, specialist nursing clinics, palliative care (both in the community and the hospice), hospital and home care, such as showering, medication management, housework and shopping. The workforce is widely distributed and mobile, particularly in district nursing and home care.
Nurse Maude is in the process of implementing a new patient management system (CRM) across the organisation to replace an existing patient management system which does not meet the needs of the organisation as it moves to a more technology-assisted work environment. This is a significant transition for the organisation which particularly affects its community nursing, home care, specialist services, the Hub and service co-ordination, as well as other support services. Nurse Maude wants to undertake evaluation research into the implementation process, with a view to utilising the information to inform any future major transitions and to position Nurse Maude as an organisation with the skills to introduce a new patient management system across a large, widely distributed workforce.
The aim of the project is to carry out two focus groups to gather a rich understanding of the views regarding the implementation of the new electronic patient management system and its use.
Eight staff will be selected for each group. It is anticipated that one group will be district nurses and the other will be team leaders. Criteria will be developed that ensure a spread across the age groups, technology literacy and years employed with Nurse Maude.
Data will be collected via focus groups to gather information about barriers, challenges and benefits of the implementation process, alongside use the new technology.
Descriptive thematic analysis will be undertaken with the data obtained from the focus groups. NVivo is available through Nurse Maude and will be used for data management during the data analysis.
Ethical approval for the summer studentship project will be obtained through the University of Otago, and then lodged with the Nurse Maude Ethics Committee.
The student will be bound by all ethics requirements in relation to ensuring the data is kept confidential, and reported in an ethical way meeting publication requirements.
The student will undertake the focus groups, thematic data analysis, produce the written report, present findings to Nurse Maude staff, and the UOC summer studentship presentation, draft the publication and work with the supervisors to prepare this for publication.
The student will gain skills in qualitative research and thematic analysis (including using NVivo which Nurse Maude has available).