The engagement of nursing and healthcare researchers with digital technologies: lessons learnt in an Australian university

Abstract

Background

The use of digital technologies has expanded rapidly in recent years, particularly with the onset of COVID-19. Digital technologies have been implemented in nursing and healthcare to support necessary care.

Aims

This research explored how nursing and healthcare researchers engage with digital technologies, including the types of technologies, facilitators, barriers and suggested improvements to enable engagement.

Methods

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 36 nursing and healthcare researchers from an Australian University. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, coded and thematically analysed using the COREQ checklist.

Results

Four major types of digital technologies were engaged by nursing and healthcare researchers. These included monitoring, intervention, communication and data collection and analysis technologies. The research setting provided the overarching systems and policies that could delay actions or provide necessary supports. Access to experts, good communication, sharing digital technology information, and time and funding were identified as important.

Conclusion

This research highlights that nursing and healthcare researchers are engaging with digital technologies but there are areas for improvement that are underpinned by the research setting and need to be considered to ensure effective use of digital technologies in nursing and healthcare research.

Keywords

digital technology health healthcare nursing research university

Introduction

Digital technologies are electronic tools, systems, devices and resources that generate, store or process data. These may include, wearable devices, mobile applications, virtual reality, robotics, mhealth (mobile health), multimedia tools, video games and telehealth. They are pervasive in society, having implications on many activities including communication, education and healthcare. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, digital technology use has become even more important to connect people and support continued functioning of society whilst physically distancing. In the nursing and healthcare field, many examples of digital technologies developed to track and collect health data and allow health providers to provide assessments and treatment remotely have emerged (Vargo et al., 2021). It has been important that healthcare continues efficiently, but this has required rapid advancements in digital technologies.

Research aiming to describe digital technology use both prior and during COVID-19 has focused use of digital technologies by nurses and health professionals (Doades and Winkelmann, 2019; Foong et al., 2020; Holden, 2011; Koivunen and Saranto, 2018; Slevin et al., 2020) or patients (Curtis and Price, 2017; Schlomann, 2018; Slevin et al., 2020). Research investigating nursing and healthcare researcher engagement with digital technologies, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic is limited to small case studies (Beleigoli et al., 2019; De Redon and Centi, 2019), or investigations of single technologies (Archibald et al., 2019; Loncar-Turukalo et al., 2019). The aim of this research was to investigate nursing and healthcare researcher engagement with digital technologies. Specifically, to identify the types of digital technologies nursing and healthcare researchers engage with; facilitators and barriers to their use and what could improve digital technology use. This research is important to help identify actions to support nursing and healthcare researchers’ digital technology innovation and use.

Methodology

This qualitative study used in-depth interviews to understand nursing and healthcare researchers, use of digital technologies. For this paper, digital technologies encompass the use of digital technology hardware and software, to both aid, and as the focus of research. Potential participants were from an Australian university and identified through the university webpages and snowballing techniques. Participants met inclusion criteria if they were conducting research in the nursing and healthcare field at the specific university. Recruitment and interviews occurred between November 2020 and April 2021 (during the COVID-19 pandemic). A participant information sheet was shared with participants who responded to the email invite. Participants were informed that the research would provide insight to the university and the results would be published. Informed consent was obtained before participants completed a 10-minute online survey that collected background information followed by a 30–60 minute in-person or online interview. The interviewers were experienced in conducting interviews and did not know any of the participants. The interviews followed a semi-structured format (Supplementary Table S1) and recruitment ceased when no further new topics were brought up in the interviews.

The research is underpinned by constructivist views, that there is no single reality, but views of reality have been elicited from the participants (Howe and Berv, 2000). Principles of qualitative content analysis were used to identify commonalities and differences in the data and determine relationships between themes, with a focus on descriptive conclusions (Gale et al., 2013). The Framework Approach (Bryman and Burgess, 1994) was applied to organise the analysis process using NVivo 10 software (QSR International Pty Ltd, Doncaster, Victoria, Australia): familiarisation with the data; identification of themes; identification of data relating to a particular theme; placement of the data into the themes; and creating a summary of the data. Initially coding was based on the research questions including types of digital technologies, facilitators and barriers of digital technology use, and suggestions for how to improve digital technology engagement. Themes and subthemes were developed by drawing connections between the codes and describing the theme based on the content of the code.

All quotes included in the transcript were shared with participants and the manuscript was shared with two participants to ensure accuracy. Ethical approval was provided by the Flinders University Human Research Ethics Committee, and this study was performed in line with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki.

Results

Thirty-six participants took part in the interviews (60% non-respondent rate). Participant characteristics (Table 1) and main themes and subthemes (Table 2) are presented.

Table 1

. The characteristics of a sample of nursing and healthcare university researchers involved in research conducted between November 2020 and April 2021.

Characteristics (N = 36)	%
Sex
Male	23
Female	77
Academic level
Early career researcher	14
Research and teaching	31
Senior researcher	36
Professor	19
Comfort with digital technologies
Favourable	77
Neutral	12
Unfavourable	11

Table 2.

The main themes and subthemes related to a sample of nursing and healthcare researchers and their engagement with digital technologies in research (N = 36).

Theme	Subtheme	Explanation
Types of digital technologies used in research
Types of digital technologies used by researchers		The function of digital technologies used by researchers based on their mechanism of action
	Monitoring	Digital technologies applied as monitoring tools to capture and hold data
	Intervention	Digital technologies that aim to educate and create behaviour change
	Communication	Digital technologies used to aid conversation from a distance and for delivery of messages
	Data collection and analysing	Digital technologies used to collect, store and analyse data
Factors impacting engagement with digital technologies in research
Research setting		The overall impact that the organisation where the research occurs has on a researcher’s engagement with digital technologies
	Access to experts	Access to experts to assist with digital technology related research
	Communication	The ability of all stakeholders involved in the digital technology related research to understand each other
	Access to sharing of digital technology information	Opportunities for researchers to share and learn about digital technologies
	Access to time and funding	Access to funding to support digital technology related research and time to conduct such research

Types of digital technologies used by researchers

Digital technologies used by researchers were classified into four types based on the mechanism of action: monitoring, intervention, communication, data collection and analysis. The first two types predominantly related to digital technologies developed and trialled by researchers, and the remainder predominantly related to digital technologies used to conduct research.

Monitoring

Monitoring tools referred to technologies that collected individual’s data including behaviours or locations, and functions to allow individuals to input data to assess health or health risk. This information could be for personal use or to share with health professionals through digital platforms. This category also incorporated digital technologies used to monitor systems and processes, such as frameworks that use algorithms to make meaning of data collected.

‘The machine will put together all the risk factors to recognise risk of cardiovascular event.’ (Participant 10)

‘Internet of things. Basically, your fridge, your air conditioning, your toothbrush, all of these things that are on the internet now. We can tell whether you cleaned your teeth this morning or not. We can tell if you’ve got enough food in your fridge.’ (Participant 22)

‘using complexity science … and a decision-making algorithms within a dashboard … when we think of a dashboard it could be through an iPad or a tablet, or a mobile phone or a computer, something like an app ....’ (Participant 23)

Intervention

Digital technology interventions aimed to educate and create behaviour change. These technologies could provide therapy (e.g. virtual reality applications) or guidance with health behaviours (e.g. online programs), education and personalised feedback (record and utilise individual data), and scheduling of daily activities and reminders.

‘There will be an online portal to allow patients to complete their therapy online. People will call in to help them stay on track and do assessments.’ (Participant 8)

‘Virtual reality headset and headphones and controllers linked to high powered computer and can use all those sensors to interact.’ (Participant 7)

‘The other thing about these avatars which is probably less well subliminal, they deliver a word-perfect evidence-based education session every time.’ (Participant 5)

Communication

Digital technologies used for the purpose of communication included videoconferencing, telehealth and social media. These digital technologies were used to facilitate the research process and as a focus of research (e.g. remote patient interactions) to communicate with others individually, in groups or in larger conference style meetings.

‘Incredibly useful [Teams and Zoom] ……… I know there can be challenges with it in terms of connections and all those sorts of things, but I do think there is huge utility in being able to do this [use Teams and Zoom].’ (Participant 18)

‘Patient recruitment through Facebook was really successful.’ (Participant 2)

Data collection and analysis

Data collection and analysis technologies included tablets, databases, survey tools, cloud storage and web-based software. These digital technologies were often reported to streamline research processes such as sorting, storing and analysing a range of data (e.g. software to measure metrics and programs), facilitate working in teams, and provide an easy central access point for all stakeholders.

‘using an online survey certainly benefits in terms of saving researcher time. And it means that you can run a far greater number of participants through a study than you can with a face-to-face study.’ (Participant 36)

‘My students and I might use transcription services that use modern technology.’ (Participant 14)

The next themes refer to factors identified as impacting nursing and healthcare researcher’s engagement with digital technologies in research.

Research setting

Working within the organisation’s systems, in this case a university, was reported to involve stringent scientific protocols and permissions, rules, and templates, and this was perceived to slow research. Researchers reported exploring options available externally to the university to overcome these issues.

‘Apparently the university have told the graphic designers of our website they’re not allowed to have a separate channel. So we’ve got to go on the main university website, which requires lots of permissions and made my video basically unsearchable .... People have to have the website link … They can’t search for it and find it in YouTube, which is really limiting our research breadth and people being able to access things easily.’ (Participant 30)

Other researchers highlighted the benefits of working within the university system.

‘They (university media team) looked at what was possible in their systems and processes and fed that back to us and we had to submit things to them to put out there. They (university media team) were incredibly supportive … Having their support and engagement in the project made a big difference for us, it helped us to navigate the complexity of having to meet the rules and regulations of the uni.’ (Participant 13)

Generic training was provided by the university surrounding digital technologies and their software, but for some staff, this was not sufficient. Similarly, university information technology support was useful, but specific experts were sometimes desired.

‘Technology can be overwhelming. Having someone with good technical skills on the team who can support others helps.’ (Participant 9)

Access to experts

Many researchers shared that having access to people with expert digital technology experience was essential for effective use of digital technologies. Basic courses were useful, but experts were required past the introductory stage. Experts varied and were people from within the team, previous connections, a specialised help centre, or an external provider.

‘I also drew on the software development guys that I was working with because they tended to attend a lot of expos and things and would shoot me an email and go, “Hey, there we’ve got …., I saw this …., this bit of tech at this expo is coming out but I know this person who works for [company name] who can get me this sooner if you want it?”’ (Participant 7)

One researcher spoke of the positive experience they had due to having access to a digital technology support team that they could access at any time. Whilst other researchers did not have this and spoke of having to utilise contractors, but being left stranded when the contractor moved on or their funding ran out.

‘Relies on the guy that made the software. I think he tried to make the program where we could reuse it, but he has moved on and we really need his help.’ (Participant 2)

Researchers were also reaching out for specialist help beyond digital technology experts, such as legal and commercialisation advice. This support was required to deal with specific technicalities that researchers could not keep on top of among all of their research requirements.

‘The other thing that we’re going to need, which sort of sits outside of the technology itself, is some support in designing a clinical trial that meets the requirements from a scientific point of view, but also from a commercialisation kind of point of view.’ (Participant 11)

Communication

Researchers wanted access to someone that knew about both nursing and healthcare research and digital technologies. There was a need to ‘bridge the gap between fields’ (Participant 8) and to help with communication technicalities by being across all fields involved. Researchers spoke about ‘wasted time’ due to not being able to express what they want effectively to digital technology experts. It was noted that it takes time to learn each other’s technical language.

‘As a healthcare professional, you don’t understand what the technology you are developing might look like, therefore it can be hard to describe what you want to the tech team [the developers]… it takes time to learn each others’ language … Using terminology that is correct to you might mean something different to someone from a different field.’ (Participant 8)

In addition to differences in communication, it was indicated that there is a need for open communication between the digital technology developers, researchers and all involved.

‘So everybody’s got a different lens on what they want out of it, but somehow you’ve got to accommodate and bring everybody to an agreed outcome.’ (Participant 26)

Access to sharing of digital technology information

Researchers desired opportunities to share and learn from others about their digital technology ideas and experiences. Sharing of ‘crazy ideas’ and how they had turned into reality. Researchers also wanted access to the latest news on digital technologies and updates on what was out there.

‘the process of finding new software – search, trial and hope for the best … There should be some support around the pros and cons of these software programs’ (Participant 15)

Researchers wanted to share digital technology experiences across the university. There was sometimes a non-willingness, due to fears such as stealing ideas, but it was generally desired.

‘Different disciplines at different stages with tech use and can learn from each other overall’ (Participant 5)

Access to time and funding

Researchers mentioned the barriers of limited time and funding often halted their ability to engage with digital technologies. Funding limited the type of technology employed. A few researchers indicated that if they had had more funding, they would have chosen a different technology. For example one researcher indicated,

‘We know for sure that if we had more money, we would have done an App [smartphone], and not only a web platform.’ (Participant 10)

As the research should be translatable to the real world, the expense of the technology was also seen as limiting the applicability of research. In a few cases, researchers had been given a portion of funding, but not enough to take it past the prototyping stage.

‘I think funding is a huge, huge issue. I do not know where the solution sits for that … We are missing a huge piece of the puzzle as technology is becoming increasingly important.’ (Participant 13)

Access to digital technology software and programs that were paid for by the university, or freely provided by developers, were reported as valuable.

‘I think the biggest facilitators in digital research are these kinds of digital technologies [smartphones and their accessories, laptops etc.] being accessible ....’ (Participant 13)

Some researchers discussed the benefit of ownership of digital technologies as compared to using someone else’s digital program, platform, or device. Ownership came at a cost but removed the constraints set by using other’s technologies.

‘Well, because we’ve got ownership over the website. I feel like we’ve kind of just done a load more changes to it. I think we have the freedom to do that because we own it and we have done it ourselves.’ (Participant 30)

In addition to funding, researchers indicated that they ‘just need time to play with technology’ (Participant 4). But there was a fine line between having time to play and researchers feeling that they had been left abandoned to learn a technology.

‘We need training on software when we need it. I mostly use YouTube [to look up how to do things] and it takes a lot of time … It feels like we cannot contact someone to ask questions.’ (Participant 17)

Discussion

This research involved speaking with nursing and healthcare researchers during the COVID-19 pandemic regarding their digital technology use in research. Researchers used digital technologies to collect and analyse their data, improve communication, and as monitoring and intervention tools to improve the information collected and speed and specificity of individual advice and treatment.

This research demonstrates the complexity and range of digital technologies that nursing and healthcare researchers are readily engaging with. Across all four types of digital technologies identified in this research, researchers have to equip themselves with the knowledge and skills to work with digital technologies that are constantly evolving, updating and improving (Kaczmarczyk et al., 2021; Vargo et al., 2021; Xiong et al., 2021). Digital technologies are now commonplace and integral to the nursing and healthcare profession and COVID-19 has accelerated changes and rapid innovation in digital technologies (Vargo et al., 2021).

Inevitably digital technology engagement sits within an organisation (Martins and Terblanche, 2003). The organisation’s strategy, structure, support mechanisms, behaviours that encourage innovation and open communication, all impact how well digital technologies are embraced and used (Martins and Terblanche, 2003). A study of health system stakeholders implementing digital health innovations, revealed that high-level policy barriers within organisations, impeded widespread adoption of innovations. The study emphasised the critical role of an organisation in developing a vision and creating a foundation for innovative activities (Desveaux et al, 2019). In this research, the university provided the foundation for digital technology use and innovation. The policies and procedures in place impacted the culture for digital technology use. Researchers in this study identified the university as a provider of an encouraging environment for digital technology engagement including providing digital labs, and courses to improve acceptance and use of digital technologies. On the other hand, the university was said to not always support digital technology engagement, due to procedures and protocols that were complicated, introduced time delays and limited access to digital technologies and supports. This follows with some criticisms placed on universities of being slow and having disconnected institutional processes (Hansson and Polk, 2018; Caro-Gonzalez and Ferreira-Lopes, 2020). Whilst it is important to acknowledge that researchers need to be accountable for honing their digital capabilities, and further integration of health informatics should now be a requirement within health curricula, this research suggests attention on the research setting is needed to ensure a supportive environment.

Factors within the university setting that affected research with digital technologies included, access to sharing digital technology information, access to experts, including clear communication, and access to funding and time.

Nursing and healthcare researchers reported wanting to know what digital technologies are used outside of their field. They wanted to better understand digital technology advancement and be inspired by others through sharing of information on digital technologies. Evidence reveals that researchers will often engage with digital technologies based on knowledge that is reflected in their discipline area and previous experiences (Tsatsou, 2016). This practice limits researchers to what they are familiar with and may mean they miss advancements of technologies outside of their field (Yoo et al., 2010). These findings suggest that facilitating sharing of digital technology information, within and across disciplines can be further supported to keep researchers abreast of digital technology advancements.

Along with sharing digital technology ideas, researchers noted collaborations with digital technology experts were essential. The involvement of digital technology experts is one way to ease a researcher’s experience with new or technical digital technologies (Venkatesh et al., 2003; Venkatesh and Davis, 2000). Digital technology experts are an important member of the team when developing digital technologies or when working with digital technologies experts can be someone to call on to speed up learning and problem solving. Researchers in this study identified that digital technology expert support did not always meet their needs. Researchers using digital technologies to facilitate research, wanted answers to their digital technology problems in real time, however, researchers indicated that they did not always have this support. At times, researchers would need to source their own answers, that could involve searching the internet, creating time delays and uncertainties (Rowlands et al., 2008). Along with experts, digital technology champions, are people already present at the university and are confident users of specific technologies, and are recommended as beneficial to provide quick instant support (Reinhart et al., 2011; Sitnicki, 2018). A systematic review of 101 studies of technology use, reported that the presence and use of champions, along with organisational support and management, had the biggest impact on successful digital technology implementation (Gagnon et al., 2012). This research suggests that ensuring access to experts or champions can be of great value.

When working with experts, champions and other stakeholders, effective communication with all involved in digital technology related research was mentioned by participants as essential. Research supports the importance for all members involved in complex tasks to understand each other (Suter et al., 2009). Difficulties can arise in collaborations when there is a lack of clear definition and understanding, particularly surrounding innovations that are in early development phase (Mann et al., 2019). Recommendations include clearly defined communication pathways, and opportunities to express ideas and clarify uncertainties (Liu et al., 2019; Mann et al., 2019). Researchers in this study commonly reported the need to have stakeholders involved that understood both digital technologies and nursing and healthcare research. Each field has its own jargon, and having someone who could translate and clear confusions was valuable. Teams that had worked together previously highlighted the benefits of being able to build on existing relationships and understanding that had already been built highlighting the benefit of developing long term relationships with stakeholders.

Limited funding and time are common grievances for researchers (Martin, 2000), with the two being interrelated. There is research suggesting that with digital technology innovation this will reduce costs for people, organisations and society (Ciborra, 2006; Nsengiyumva et al., 2018; Schwertner, 2017). Technologies have been shown to take over a number of practices and improve time and efficiencies (Ciborra, 2006; Nsengiyumva et al., 2018; Schwertner, 2017). However, there is little research into the funding constraints on researchers who are developing the digital technologies. Researchers in this study reported that digital technologies come with expensive price tags and in some cases inhibit the advancement of their research or require abandoning the research. This research is a reminder that if digital technology innovation is desired then time and money is needed and benefits from organisational support (Sherry, 2002).

Limitations

Limitations may include that participants held back on sharing all information due to privacy and intellectual property rights surrounding digital technologies. Memory recall may also be a factor that affected the information provided, however, the research team provided an opportunity for researchers to think over the interview questions by sending the questions prior to the interview. The sample was determined by snowballing methods, which may have biased the information, however, we endeavoured to get a spread of nursing and healthcare researchers.

Conclusion

Overall, nursing and healthcare researchers engage with a variety of digital technologies to both conduct and act as the focus of their research. With the rapid advancements in digital technology innovation including since the COVID-19 pandemic onset, there was some clear facilitating and inhibiting factors and lessons to be learnt to improve nursing and healthcare research involving digital technologies. Having a supportive setting that facilitates the access to experts, sharing of digital technology information and provision of funds was important for the researchers in this study. Sharing and cross disciplinary learning helps to learn from each other’s ideas. Whilst effective communication is essential and can be aided by involving people that know both technologies and healthcare. Support in the form of experts and champions can help with digital technology innovation. These factors are important to consider when the university is developing policies and procedures as these set the scene for fostering digital technology engagement of nursing and healthcare researchers

Key points for policy, practice and/or research

• The research setting sets the scene for digital technology related research with the systems, policies and procedures either facilitating or inhibiting the research.

• Nursing and healthcare researchers are using a range of digital technologies in their research that fit four broad categories of monitoring, intervention, communication and data collection and analysis.

• Policy and systems in nursing and healthcare research need to consider the value of collaborations and cross disciplinary learning to facilitate innovation and digital technology use.

• Investigating the value of experts and digital technology champions to support effective digital technology use is warranted including effective communication between technology experts and researchers.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental Material - The engagement of nursing and healthcare researchers with digital technologies: lessons learnt in an Australian university

Supplemental Material for The engagement of nursing and healthcare researchers with digital technologies: lessons learnt in an Australian university by Anna Roesler and Belinda Lange in Journal of Research in Nursing

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the Caring Futures Institute for supporting this research and the researchers who shared their experiences and perspectives on this topic.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Ethical approval

The research has been approved by Flinders University Human Research Ethics Committee (project number 2925).

ORCID iD

Anna Roesler

Supplemental material

Supplemental material for this article is available online.

Anna Roesler works as a research officer with Flinders University and completed her PhD with the Adelaide University in public health.

Belinda Lange is the Research Lead for Technology in the Caring Futures Institute in the College of Nursing and Health Sciences at Flinders University.

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