Bernardo, Anthony, (1998). Technology and True presence in Nursing. Holistic Nursing Practice 10(7), 95-101.According to the author, nursing practice needs to stay current with technological advances while keeping its identity as a patient focused profession. Nurses use technology to improve care from a patient’s perspective, both in quality of care and cost. At the same time, nurses must learn to balance technological knowledge with personal skills, thus providing optimum clinical care while maintaining a person-focused relationship with the patient.Technological advances enable nurses to provide accurate, timely care for a patient. This is due to the fact that these advances enable doctors and nurses to quickly diagnose, explain and predict the health-illness status of a patient, thus allowing health care professionals to spend less time finding answers, and more time providing quality care. For nurses, this includes spending time with the patient establishing rapport, communication and a trusting relationship for optimum clinical care. Machines may advance the diagnosis and treatment of patients, but will never be able to replace the nurse’s ability to interact with the patient and interpret the feelings, expressions and actions of patients (and at times, their family members). This interaction aids the nurse in his or her integral role as provider of care and patient advocate, as well as, in the communication process with patient and family in regard to the patient’s health-illness status. Technology will never be able to effectively replace the nurse’s duties of listening, reassuring, and educating a patient. Dear Editor:In response to the 1998 article “Technology and True Presence in Nursing” published in the Holistic Nursing Practice journal, I agree with the author that technology focuses mainly on the dependent and interdependent aspects of nursing. These roles depend heavily on th...
