DIGITAL COGNITIVE ERGONOMICS IN NURSING: DESIGNING TECHNOLOGIES AROUND ATTENTION, MEMORY, AND CLINICAL WORKFLOW

Abstract

Digital technologies now mediate a large proportion of nursing work. Electronic health records, medication administration systems, physiological monitors, mobile communication tools, clinical decision support, virtual care platforms, and artificial intelligence applications influence how nurses detect change, remember future actions, organize priorities, document observations, communicate across teams, and coordinate care. These systems can increase access to information and standardize important processes. They can also create new cognitive demands when relevant data are fragmented, alerts are excessive, task state is lost after interruption, or documentation pathways do not correspond to the realities of care. In such circumstances, a technology may be technically functional while still making nursing work harder, slower, and less safe.

Human factors and ergonomics shifts attention away from blaming individuals for predictable difficulties and toward designing work systems that account for human capabilities and limitations. The systems approach is especially relevant to nursing because performance is shaped not only by an individual nurse's knowledge or vigilance, but also by staffing, task distribution, device design, workspace, policy, communication, and organizational priorities (Carayon et al., 2014; Holden et al., 2013). The World Health Organization's patient safety agenda similarly emphasizes systems, learning, and the reduction of avoidable harm rather than reliance on individual perfection