The purpose of this study was to identify the degree to which nursing diagnoses accepted by NANDA are used and to identify problems in application of nursing diagnoses in clinical practice. With the expanding potential fur computerization of nursing diagnosis, the survey also included data on the present status of hospital computerization and willingness to use computerized nursing diagnoses. The data collection was done from July 1 to August 3, 1996 using structured questionnaires. The questionnaires were mailed to 1,126 head nurses working in 44 hospitals with on occupacy of over 500 beds located in Korea, of these, 883 were returned from 40 hospitals. Among the 883 questionnaires, 867 were used for the analysis. The results of the analysis are as follows 1. Among 109 nursing diagnoses, pain, constipation, diarrhea, hyperthermia, high risk for infection, sleep pattern disturbance, and anxiety, chronic pain, altered urinary elimination, and altered nutrition: less than body requirements were the ten most frequently used diagnoses. 2. The primary problem in the use of nursing diagnoses was lack of time and personnel. Others were lack of knowledge and motivation, absence of protocols and absence of the appropriate methods to apply nursing diagnoses. 3. Among the 40 hospitals, 27 hospitals used a computerized system and expressed willingness to utilize the computerized system of nursing diagnoses that is planned for the future.

Even though Korean medical law stipulates that number of patients attended by a nurse is 2.5 for hospitalization and 30 for ambulatory care, the number of patients cared by a nurse per day is much greater than the standard prescribed by the medical law. Current nursing productivity of nurses is not desirable unless the quality of care considered. Moreover, nursing manpower staffing based on neither current nurses' productivity nor standard of medical law cannot respond properly to dynamic situation of the medical services. As for the nurse scheduling, the critical problem of it in the hospital is determining the day-to-day shift assignments for each nurse for the specified period in a way that satisfies the given requirements of the hospital. Nurse scheduling, however, involves many factors and requirements, manual scheduling requires much time and effort to produce an adequate schedule. Under these backgrounds, the necessity of more efficient management of nursing manpower occupying 1/3 of total hospital workers has been recognized by many nursing administrators. This study was performed to develop a system computerizing nurse staffing and scheduling based on the patient classification. As a preliminary step for the system development, nursing workload in a secondary hospital was measured from Sep. to Oct. 1994. On the grounds of this result, computerization of nurse staffing and scheduling was proceeded with three options. First one is based on the current medical law. Second one is based on the assigned number of nursing staff. And the last is based on the request by patient classification. Computer languages used in this study were MS Visual Basic 3.0 for the staffing and Access 2.0 for the scheduling, respectively. Prospective users may operate this system easily because icons and mouse are used for easier graphic user interface and reducing the need for typing efforts. This system can help nurse administrators manage nursing manpower efficiently and nurses develop quick and easy schedule generation and allow more time for the patient care.

This study was designed to develop a basic plan for computerization of nursing records. The subjects were 7 nursing record forms, 58 charts, 23 nurses, 2 nurses managers, a nurse and computer specialist, 16 master course students and 3 professors. Data collection was conducted through questionnaire, observation and interview. The collected data were analyzed for problems, plan of improvement and needs for computerization. Based upon these results, it is recommended that nursing record computerization was needed a basic plan to integrate needs of nursing record computerization. The basic plan as follows: 1. To illustrate a data flow path of nursing record and data dictionary that show nurse's work and record process. 2. To establish a system in order to use multi-tasking and graphic user interface. 3. To establish hardware and software in order to embody integrated management of computer based system through structured walk through. 4. To choose effective database management system and to achieve Log as record unit.