Nursing Informatics and Digital Technology Using in Aging Home Care Delivery Development

This participatory action research aimed to enhance nurses’ role in informatics and digital technology for aging home care delivery at 13 health-promoting hospitals, in Kantharawichai District, Mahasarakham Province, Northeastern Thailand from January - December 2021. There were 139 participants; 13 nurses, 52 community caregivers, 37 family caregivers, and 37 bed-bound elderly. The researchers facilitated the participants sharing of their own experiences and reflected on aging home care. This research included four phases; 1) Assessment; data was collected through in-depth interviews, small group dialogue, and observation of nurses and caregivers practicing, 2) Intervention planning; three times brainstorming was created for health problem identification and intervention planning, 3) Intervention; participants joined aging home care delivery, 4) Evaluation; brainstorming was created for each health promoting hospital evaluation. Content analysis was used for data analysis. Results showed that; Nurses as care managers of this PAR cooperative learning efforts increased knowledge, attitude, and practice in informatic and digital technology to develop aging home care. They formulated strategies to supervise caregivers caring for bed-bound elderly; 1) enhancing caregivers’ knowledge through the application, raising awareness and skill regarding informatics and digital technology applied for care plan and counseling, 2) promotion of online reports for aging caregiver activities, 3) creation line official for supervising caregiver caring, and 4) online network development of aging home care delivery linked to district hospital for medical consulting and local administrative organization for economic and social consulting. The empowering participatory process of this PAR could encourage nurses to create a way for effective supervision and cooperative primary care through line official effectiveness. This process can be applied to create and enhance informatics and digital technology for complex caring in rural areas.