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Nursing Community Survey

March 2007

Slide | 2

Survey Background• Survey includes 507 Epocrates nurses• Primary working regions

– Urban 51%– Suburban 35%– Rural 14%

• Primary clinical setting– Hospital 69%– Outpatient clinic or physician practice 14%– Academic center 7%– Long-term care facility 3%– Other 7%

• Years in practice– Less than 10 years 30%– 10 – 19 years 34%– More than 25 years 34%

Female: 75%

Male: 25%

Slide | 3

Primary motivators for nurses: desire to help and interest in medicine

Which factors were most important to you in choosing to enter the medical profession and become a nurse? (n=507)*

3%

3%

8%

11%

19%

28%

38%

64%

69%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Nursing recruitment program

Didn't know w hat else to do

Family tradition

Experienced something medically traumatic

Wanted f lexible hours

Desired guaranteed employment

Reputable profession

Interested in science & medicine

Wanted to help people

*Nurses allow to select up to 3 choices % of nurse respondents

Slide | 4

Nurses are dedicated to career choice

Knowing what you do now, would you still choose a career in

nursing? (n=507)

No 15%

Yes 85%

Top reasons why not:• Poor compensation

• Feel overworked, under appreciated

• Would rather be a doctor

• High stress

• Too political

Slide | 5

65% of nurses spend more time on administration today than 3 yrs ago

Compared to three years ago, please estimate if you spend more, less or the same amount of time on the following activities:

% of nurses

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Patientcommunication/counsel

Administration Administering &monitoring medications

Providing acute care Maintaining a safeenvironment

MoreThe SameLess

Slide | 6

3-yr trends expected to continue – growth in admin and focus on safety

Thinking ahead three years from now, please estimate if you spend more, less or the same amount of time on the following activities:

% of nurses

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Patientcommunication/counsel

Administration Administering &monitoring medications

Providing acute care Maintaining a safeenvironment

MoreThe SameLess

Slide | 7

Patients show nurses the most respect; medical students the least

In general, what degree do you feel the below groups respect nurses? (n=507)

83%78% 75%

54% 51%44% 41%

0

20

40

60

80

100

Respected

PatientsNPsNursesPharmacistsPAsPhysiciansMed students

% of respondents

Slide | 8

72% believe staffing shortages are the greatest healthcare challenge

What do you feel are the greatest challenges facing the healthcare industry today? (n=507)*

*Nurses allowed to select up to 3 choices; includes responses above 15%

% of nurse respondents

16%

17%

19%

20%

21%

23%

34%

46%

72%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Declining reimbursement

Administrative burdens

Underinsured patients

Increasing medical device/test costs

Increasing drug costs

Managed care restrictions

Uninsured patients

Not enough time w/ patients

Insufficient staffing/resources

Slide | 9

Nursing shortage translates to more responsibilities in less time

How has the nursing shortage impacted your practice? (n=507)*

20%

55%

64%

74%

75%

76%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Increased my salary

Increased # of hours Iwork

Decreased quality ofpatient care

Decreased time spentwith patients

Increased responsibilities

Increased patient load

*Nurses allowed to select up to 3 choices% of nurse respondents

Slide | 10

Over 60% of nurses expect healthcare system to worsen in 5 years

Over the next 5 years, how do you believe the U.S. healthcare system will change? (n=507)

Improve24%

Worsen62%

Remain unchanged

14%

Slide | 11

Over 90% believe better working conditions & financial incentives will attract students

Please rate the degree to which you believe the following would be effective in attracting more students into the nursing profession:

% of nurses

76%

87%

91%

91%

93%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

More nursing educationprograms

More recognition asessential caregiver

Better compensation

Tuition reimbursement

Improved workingconditions

Slide | 12

Over 50% avoid 2 or more medical errors per week with mobile clinical references

14%15%

18%19%

35%

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

3 or moretimes per week

2 times perweek

Once per week Once permonth

Less thanonce per

month

% of nurses

Please estimate how often mobile clinical references help you avoid an adverse drug event or medical error (n=507)

Slide | 13

Mistakes and handwriting top contributors to medical errors

# of nurses

What factors do you feel contribute the most to medical errors?

*Nurses allowed to select up to 3; includes responses above 15%

31%33%

48%

60%64%

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Human error Illegiblehandwriting

Inadequatestaffing

Lack ofcommunication

among clinicians

Fatigue

Slide | 14

Over 50% believe better staff/patient ratios could improve safety

Please identify which initiatives could most positively impact medication error reduction? (n=507)*

6%

8%

10%

12%

13%

14%

39%

42%

51%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

Advanced degrees in nursing

Mobile clinical references

More education and training on safety

Electronic medical record systems

Electronic prescribing

Penalty-free systems for reporting errors

Computerized prescriber order entry

Bedside bar code scanning of drugs

Improved staff/patient ratios

*Nurses allowed to select up to 2 choices

% of nurse respondents

Note: 69% are hospital-based nurses

Slide | 15

77% expect to be using EMRs within three year

Looking ahead three years, please estimate if you will be using the below technologies more, less or the same compared to today

% of nurses

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

EMRs CPOE PDA Bar coding Laptopcomputer

Desktopcomputer

Tablet PCSmartphoneBlackberry

MoreThe SameLess

Slide | 16

~75% believe cost is the main hurdle to nurses adopting technology

Why do you believe nurses have not adopted technology as quickly as physicians (n=507)*

*Nurses allowed to select two

% of nurse respondents

5%

7%

14%

21%

51%

56%

74%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Less need for clinicalinformation

Prefer the Internet

Pefer standard referencebooks

Not enough valuable PDAapplications

Uncomfortable withtechnology

Don't understand thebenefits of using PDAs

Too expensive

Slide | 17

97% believe mobile clinical references provide an advantage

To what extent do you agree/disagree that having access to clinical information on your PDA give you an advantage over your nursing

colleagues that do not use a PDA (n=507)

Strongly agree71%

Neutral3%

Somewhat agree

7%

Agree19%

Slide | 18

Using the Survey Results

Thank you for your interest in the Nursing Community Survey. The results are available for unrestricted use. Please reference the ISMP and the Epocrates Market Research Panel when sourcing the survey data.