Patient documentation in home health nursing in Norway - a study of attitudes among professionals

Introduction: Professionals in home health nursing mainly work alone in patients’ homes. This makes documentation from the electronic patient record crucial for carrying out proper care. The aim of this study was to elaborate on knowledge of home health nursing professionals’ attitudes towards electronic nursing documentation, and to investigate whether attitudes towards documentation and its performance differ with professionals’ education level and working experiences. Methods: A sample of 161 home health nursing employees in Mid-Norway answered a questionnaire including statements about experiences of nursing documentation and its use. Data was analysed by descriptive statistics and bivariate analysis in SPSS. Results: Of the sample, 77 respondents had higher education (HE), and 84 had lower education (LE). In total, 46 had less than 4 years’ experience at the workplace, and 115 had 4 years or more. The results showed an overall positive attitude towards documentation among the employees. However, HEs tended to have less positive attitudes towards nursing documentation than LEs. In addition, LEs more often gave neutral responses to the statements than HEs. Statistically significant differences were found in three of 11 statements: The HEs disagreed most with the statements that documentation makes it easier to find the nursing interventions planned for the patient (p=0.03), increases the quality of reporting to other caregivers (p=0.003), and provides clarification concerning the implemented nursing interventions. (p=0.04). The more experienced respondents tended to answer more positively than the less experienced. An exception was, however, found for statements dealing with the professionals’ own performance, where the less experienced tended to answer more positively than the more experienced. Conclusions: The results of this study indicate that professionals with lower education, and those with longer experience at the workplace, have more positive attitudes towards documentation in home health nursing.