350 ■ III: ROLE FUNCTIONS OF DOCTORAL ADVANCED NURSING PRACTICE
nursing informatics executive leader (AONE , 2015a, 2015b). They suggest preparation for
this role would be a master’s degree with recognition of the trend toward a doctorate. They
describe this role as someone with vision, knowledge, and skills to leverage informa-
tion technology to improve practice and outcomes and also skills to collaborate with the
C- suite to create an environment where deployment of technology supports organiza-
tional decision making in today’s challenging complex milieu. The American Nurses
Credentialing Center (ANCC) offers Nurse Executive, Advanced Board Certification
(NEA- BC), which includes informatics competencies (ANCC, 2016a). In the test content
outline, under the organizational structure and compliance section it lists knowledge
of management systems and information technology and skills in assessing, and eval-
uating technology’s impact on care delivery (ANCC, 2016a, 2016b). The NEA- BC cer-
tification requires a master’s or higher degree in nursing or bachelor’s in nursing with
master in another field. These examples provide evidence of the growing expectation of
information technology competencies in nursing leadership roles.
Other examples of nurses in administrative/ executive roles are chief nursing
informatics (or information) officer (CNIO), VP of clinical informatics, chief information
officer (CIO), or chief clinical information officer (CCIO). These nurse informaticists
are experts in the field of nursing informatics, which has been recognized as a specialty
by the American Nurses Association (2008) since 1992. There is, however, no advanced
certification for the informatics role at present. The ANCC has a specialty certification
for informatics requiring a bachelor’s degree in nursing or other relevant field (ANCC,
2014). There is a need to establish competencies for the doctoral APN in informatics if
this is to become a recognized advanced practice specialty. This role has many of the
competencies in common with the other doctoral APN roles except that their specialty
and field of research is informatics. I believe that the DNP course of study can prepare
APNs in informatics.
In addition to the trends listed in the emerging technologies section and what’s
on the horizon section I recommend referring to Gartner, Inc. Gartner identified the top
10 strategic technology trends for organizations (Gartner, 2015a) and Top Predictions
for IT Organizations and Users for 2016 and Beyond (Gartner, 2015b). For example,
by 2018, two million employees will be required to wear health and fitness tracking
devices as a condition of employment. Nursing will be able to access this data for their
patients to help guide their care. Will nurses be one of the groups required to wear a
health/ fitness tracking device? Again, as there are so many technological innovations,
it supports increasing the number and skill level of doctoral prepared nurses in the field
of informatics. As more and more devices are integrated and more data are collected,
I would like to recommend faculty and students consider use of big data for their schol-
arly projects. An excellent resource can be found at the University of Minnesota’s School
of Nursing website for big data session handouts and conference proceedings from 2013
to current year 2016. Westra et al. (2015) provide an overview of the conference and
information on the critical role of big data in nursing and provide many reasons why
nursing should be engaged.
The authors describe one of the key competencies of the doctoral APN as inter-
facing with the information systems’ team. It is necessary that the doctoral APN under-
stand what technologies are available and how these technologies can be deployed to
improve the care delivery system. Stead and Lin (2009) describe four domains of infor-
mation technology in health care: automation, connectivity, decision support, and data-
mining capabilities. When seeking solutions for problem solving or ways to improve
practice, the technology- competent doctoral APN would be able to recommend how
the technology could be deployed to resolve the issue, and then conduct an evaluation
to see whether the change is effective and whether any unintended consequences occur.