A Sense of Urgency: Integrating Technology and Informatics in Advance Practice Nursing Education

• External forces and current trends drive the use of informatics in health care.
• Technology needs to be integrated into advanced practice nursing (APN) curriculums.
• Kotter’s sense of urgency framework is used to demonstrate the integration of technology into an existing APN curriculum.
• A hypothetical advanced practice nursing program incorporating technology into specific courses is presented.

Health care is embracing technology and informatics systems that support documenting assessment findings, evaluating diagnostic labs and procedures, ordering medical tests, and coding for billing. Although advanced practice nurses possess these essential skills, are they adequately prepared to utilize this technology? In this article, we explore the external forces and current trends driving the use of informatics in health care and the need to integrate this content into the advanced practice nursing education curriculum. Kotter’s sense-of-urgency framework demonstrates the integration of technology into an existing advanced practice nursing curriculum. A hypothetical advanced practice nursing program incorporating technology into specific courses is presented.