24-hour nurse
Patient-friendly computer is full of medical know-how

By Alison Freehling
Daily Press

January 29, 2003

Stuck in a hospital bed with a collapsed lung, Chris Schumacher would wake up in the middle of the night and look around for some entertainment.

He rarely turned on the television, though. Instead, Schumacher would ask for Nurse Diane - the newest member of Mary Immaculate Hospital's medical team - to find out more about his condition.

Once Schumacher had exhausted Nurse Diane on the subject of collapsed lungs, he started asking questions about a medicine his wife was taking. Later, he pestered her about insulin injections his diabetic aunt gives herself every day.

Miraculously, Nurse Diane never lost patience or ran out of time. That's because "she" is a new computer system at Mary Immaculate, used by nurses to help patients better understand their medical problems without taking too much time away from hands-on patient care.

The portable technology, launched in Newport News about two months ago, is one example of how hospitals are trying to keep patients informed as they struggle with staffing shortages, especially a lack of nurses.

"If you've got a question, that thing has got the answers," said Schumacher, a 29-year-old Coast Guard mechanic who was stationed in Yorktown when his left lung collapsed. "It's 3 a.m. and I'm on it like, 'Go, go, go!" If a real nurse was in here, I would have driven her up the wall."

Nurse Diane - Discharge Information and Needs Educator - is a computer and VCR system stacked onto a rolling pole. Nurses can program the unit to review any one of more than 2,400 diseases, as well as tests, treatments and advice on healthy living at home. Patients touch the monitor to look at written articles or videos.

The information goes into specifics that a busy nurse might not have time to talk about. Patients with high blood pressure are told not to drink more than two glasses of beer or wine a day. Diabetics learn to drink water or diet soda between meals to fill up, instead of starchy snacks that can raise blood sugar levels.

Patients take a quiz at the end of each lesson. Results go to a central printer and onto a patient's chart, so nurses can see if they need to go over certain material again in person.

Mary Immaculate leaders stress that Nurse Diane is technology to help nurses - not to replace them.

"This is only an assistant to the nurse," said Susan Helms, a nurse and patient education coordinator at the hospital. "The nurse is always there to talk to the patient when needed, to make assessments and follow through with outcomes."

With Nurse Diane, patients and their families get detailed information and avoid the rushed conversations that sometimes happen right as they're leaving the hospital, she said. Soon, people also will be able to make copies of the lessons on Nurse Diane's VCR and take the tapes home.

"Really, patients get so much thrown at them that we want to make things as easy as possible," Helms said.

Other hospitals are using similar technology. Williamsburg Community Hospital, for example, recently launched the Get Well Network, a multimedia system with educational programs ranging from the side effects of medications to steps taken during operations. Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters has joined a national network specifically aimed at kids with serious illnesses.

Mary Immaculate has six Nurse Diane units, developed by a Richmond-based company called Patient Education Programs LLC. All of the units are programmed to speak English, Spanish, French, German, Italian and Portuguese.

Chris Schumacher said the technology helped him recover - and will help him stay healthy. He learned that he shouldn't talk too loudly when a chest tube was draining fluid from his lung. He knows to call a doctor if his temperature goes over 101 and that he needs to cut out fatty foods.

"I'm an eater, and I thought I could eat anything because I'm so skinny," he said. "Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, McDonald's - that's all going to have to go."

He leaned back on his bed, ready to talk to Nurse Diane again.

"This," he said, "is much better than anything on MTV."

Alison Freehling can be reached at 247-4789 or by e-mail at afreehling@dailypress .com.

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