Informatics competences of registered nurses – does the graduation year matter?

Abstract Background Digital services have become an essential part of nurse's work and nursing informatics competence a prerequisite for nurses to carry out their professional roles. Urgent investments are needed in informatics competence development and integrating informatics into nursing curricula. However, this has shown to be a challenge in many countries. In 2015, Finnish eHealth strategies emphasised the importance of investing more in informatics education for health professionals. This study evaluated whether these strategies have succeeded in increasing the informatics competences of registered nurses. Methods The data were collected in Finland with an electronic survey (end of 2018). The sample comprised 1639 nurses who were categorised in eight groups based on their graduation year. Analysis of covariance was used to examine whether the graduation year was associated with nurses' overall informatics competence and four specific competences (terminology based documentation; patient-related digital work; general IT competency; e-documentation according to structured national headings). Models were adjusted for age, gender, work setting and geographical area. Results Graduation year was associated with the nurses' overall informatics competence (F = 4.91 p < 0.001) and specific competences related to terminology based documentation (F = 5.27 p < 0.001), patient-related digital work (F = 4.00 p < 0.001) and general IT competency (F = 3.63 p = 0.001). Nurses graduated after the 2015 strategies (between 2016 and 2018) had the highest competence. The earlier the nurses' graduation year was the lower the nursing informatics competences. Conclusions Existing eHealth strategies may have urged Finnish nursing programs to add more informatics training in their curricula. Nurses' informatics competence affects the quality of health care, thus, more training should be provided especially for nurses with earlier graduation years who have not had formal nursing informatics education. Key messages Results highlight the importance of having eHealth strategies with educational initiatives stating the directions and objectives of education programs. Healthcare organisations should invest in providing more in-service education in nursing informatics especially for those nurses who have not had informatics included in their undergraduate studies.