Careful consideration today is given to the ways health IT can, should and might be used in the future to prevent expensive retrofits and ensure seamless system integration.
But buy-in from nurses and healthcare professionals, and proper transparency, can still sometimes be given short shrift.
It’s important for hospitals and health systems to listen to staff input, invite nurses to the table, and ensure transparency and education around new health IT’s purpose.
Buy-in and nurse ease of use are key to a solid implementation, and healthcare decision-makers need to consider nurses’ feedback and concerns to help achieve their goal ROI.
Sarah Gloyne, RN, is nurse supervisor of the innovation design unit at health system Nebraska Medicine, which covers metropolitan Omaha and extends care throughout the region, providing access to more than 1,400 doctors and nearly 70 specialty and primary care health centers.
The system’s two hospitals, Nebraska Medical Center and Bellevue Medical Center, have more than 800 beds and 9,000 employees supporting its reputation for breakthroughs in cancer care, organ transplantation and treatment of infectious diseases.
Healthcare IT News sat down with Gloyne to discuss how IT leaders can work with nurses for a clinical system implementation, the role of education around a new system implementation, ways to make nurses comfortable with new technology, and keys to success to a recent real-time locating system (RTLS) implementation.
Q. Buy-in from IT users is critical for any technology implementation. How should IT leaders and even C-suite executives work with nurses for a clinical system implementation?
A. IT leaders and C-suite executives must prioritize early and meaningful engagement with nursing staff to ensure successful clinical system implementation. Buy-in from nurses is critical, especially as new systems often represent added responsibility and a new staff badge in their daily routine.
To encourage adoption, leadership must proactively communicate the benefits of the technology from the outset, especially its role in improving daily tasks for staff. Demonstrating the facility-wide commitment through leadership consistently wearing the new technology’s badge – walking the walk – and testing the technology during safety huddles helps normalize usage, set expectations, reiterate importance and lift morale.
Tying system features like programmable workflow buttons to daily tasks also reinforces relevance and eases integration into the clinical environment.
Strong, unified messaging from both IT and executive leadership is essential. It’s important to emphasize how technology improves safety for everyone and/or benefits efficiency and the patient experience. If you’re implementing real-time location systems, as Nebraska Medicine did, some systems even integrate with patient experience platforms to display staff names and roles on patient screens. The ease of information eliminates confusion about the caregiver and increases humanism within care.
By aligning communication and focusing on clear, tangible benefits such as actionable data capture and automated workflow – turning off call lights automatically – healthcare leaders can turn skeptics into advocates. These practical improvements demonstrate how technology directly supports staff efficiency and patient care.
As a nursing supervisor, I recognize that flexibility is essential when introducing new technologies to staff, especially given that hospitals operate around the clock. It’s important that educational opportunities are inclusive of all shifts, ensuring that night and weekend staff receive the same training opportunities as their daytime counterparts.
Offering multiple sessions at varied times, and using diverse formats, such as in-person workshops, virtual modules and recorded sessions, can accommodate different schedules.
Q. What is the role of education around a new system implementation, and who should be in charge? How does the education process work at Nebraska Medicine?
A. Education is absolutely critical when we roll out a new clinical system. Our staff wants to know what’s changing, and how will it actually help them and their patients. At Nebraska Medicine, we don’t just hand off the system and walk away. We bring together nursing educators, unit leaders, clinical informaticists and our tech vendors to design education that’s both practical and meaningful.
We balance the tech side and the real-world side, making sure nurses hear from people who’ve been in the trenches. Nurse educators bring credibility; when they say, “Yes, this will work on the floor,” our team listens.
A key strategy at Nebraska Medicine is the use of hands-on, experiential learning. Before full launch, our team worked side-by-side with CenTrak, our RTLS vendor, getting real experience with the badge system – pushing buttons, running through workflows, even tweaking things based on feedback in the simulation lab.
That hands-on, interactive time helped everyone see the benefits and feel empowered to shape it. The simulation room, equipped with the new technologies, allowed staff to practice in a realistic environment and offer feedback that led to real-time system tweaks. This method allowed the staff to truly experience the benefits of the technology and have a voice at the table for necessary improvements.
The implementation team conducted testing over several months, including a full week dedicated to the hands-on training and offered multiple sessions to accommodate different staff shifts. This approach reinforced learning beyond traditional PowerPoint presentations, creating a more immersive experience for staff to see how the technology would function during their shifts.
One unique advantage during the implementation was that the unit adopting the system was new, meaning staff weren’t actively providing patient care. This allowed the education team to schedule four-hour sessions that introduced not only the badge technology but also other new systems and care models all at once.
This level of coordinated training may be more challenging in established units with varying shift schedules. To overcome this, focus again on flexibility. Offer sessions at different times and leverage clinical educators who understand both the system and the realities of nursing.
Bottom line? Our education model and vendor work were built on three pillars: hands-on practice, flexibility and real-world relevance. That’s how we made sure the technology felt smooth, meaningful and immediately useful to nursing staff.
Q. What are some ways to make nurses comfortable with new technology?
A. Making nurses feel at ease with new technology starts with straight‑talking – clear, upfront communication about what it actually does and how it helps both our patients and our team. At Nebraska Medicine, we focus on breaking the mystery down early.
We give nurses a safe place to ask anything, raise concerns and get real answers right away. We always have clinical educators and vendor experts in the room. That way, questions get answered on the spot – no confusion, no rumors.
This kind of transparency helps ensure accurate understanding and helps clear up any misinformation about how the data will be used and what features are active in their department, which helps build real confidence in the system.
Hands-on time is another critical strategy. Ensure nurses and other relevant healthcare professionals are offered opportunities to demo the technology in both simulation spaces and real patient care rooms. They get to push buttons, test features and explore how it fits into their day.
These interactive sessions allow staff to explore workflows, test features and get a feel for how the technology integrates into their routine. This practical engagement gives nurses a sense of ownership and agency, helping them connect and feel comfortable with the system’s capabilities in their day-to-day work – without the patient being present.
It also provides a forum for nurses to see the personal value such as how the system can save them steps, reduce time-consuming manual entry and streamline communication. Through these experiences, leadership can help staff see the change as an improvement rather than an imposition.
Developing trust is essential to building comfort with the new technology. At Nebraska Medicine, leadership has been intentional about setting expectations around RTLS data use, particularly in relation to staff monitoring. By ensuring protections are put into policy and explicitly stating that the system won’t be used in a disciplinary way, the organization reinforces a culture of safety, support and open teamwork.
As nurses become more familiar with the system and see its benefits in action, comfort and trust naturally increase. Healthcare professionals at Nebraska Medicine have come to trust the RTLS technology both because it works and because leadership has been upfront, responsive and respectful throughout the implementation process.
Q. This RTLS implementation you say went very smoothly. What were the keys to that successful implementation?
A. The success of the RTLS implementation can be attributed to a combination of strategic preparation, strong cross-functional collaboration and a key focus on feedback from our frontline staff.
A critical factor was our “boots on the ground” support from both internal leaders and our technology vendor CenTrak, which thoughtfully embedded themselves with our team a full week before go-live. The early involvement in the unit allowed the vendor and the implementation team to observe clinical workflows firsthand, build rapport with staff, and identify and address potential friction points in real time.
This work “on the ground” ensured that by the time the system officially launched, staff felt supported, and any technical and procedural uncertainties were addressed.
Open, ongoing and real-time communication between healthcare staff, leaders and our technology vendor played a pivotal role in sustaining momentum after our launch. The implementation team prioritized creating a clear, easy-to-use method for staff to report issues, ask questions and get timely answers.
Nurses were given space and encouraged to voice concerns over anything that wasn’t working, with the understanding that accurate, actionable feedback in the first month was critical to long-term success. This process helped fine-tune the system quickly while building trust among staff who saw their input being factored in.
Given that the technology also collected data on hand hygiene compliance, the team placed focus on ensuring that data was accurate, particularly because it could be tied to individual accountability. That transparency and responsiveness helped increase confidence in the system rather than resistance.
Beyond the implementation logistics, one of the most powerful contributors to the system’s success has been its impact on staff safety. The RTLS badge system includes buttons that staff can press in urgent situations, activating alerts that notify others on the unit and the security team.
These features have already been used during safety events, with nurses reporting that the ability to carry a real-time emergency tool on their person contributes significantly to their sense of security and peace of mind.
Ultimately, the smooth implementation wasn’t just a technical win; it was a team effort, rooted in mutual trust, responsiveness, and a shared commitment to equipping our teams with tools that work with their reality, not against it.
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Healthcare IT News is a HIMSS Media publication.
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