I work as a registered nurse at the Siun sote home hospital. The home hospital is part of a palliative care center. The home hospital provides hospital-level care to the patient’s home. My job description includes making home visits and working as part of a multi-professional team. Most of our patient are in palliative or terminal care but we also take care of patients with common infection such as pnemuonia and urinary tract infections. In my work, I use Mediatri (a patient information system) on a daily basis to record home visits and plan follow-up care for patients. I use Google Maps to find patients’ home addresses. In addition, on home visits, I carry the 9Solutions Hero personal safety button with me. I handle communication with Outlook e-mail and Teams. Other digital platforms I use are Nealink, Numeron, Populus and HaiPro.

During covid-19 pandemic, the use of Teams in our unit has increased a lot and become part of everyday life. Most of the training today is through Teams. We have also utilized Teams for remote contacts from the patient’s home. The Teams app on work phones allows home hospital nurses to consult a doctor or colleague using remote connection.

Possibilities of social media in the palliative care center

Patients have found it difficult to connect to a doctor’s remote contact from their own home computer. The reason for this is a complex encrypted email with encryption codes. A mobile certificate could be a better and easier option for this purpose, so that the patient’s identity would also be automatically verified during the login phase. However, a mobile certificate is a familiar way for many people to authenticate themselves from various online services.

Linked In would allow palliative care nurses and physicians to network professionally with other palliative care professionals. Linked In could also be used to recruit new employees.

Todoist is an electronic calendar platform for work and leisure. Things to remember can be prioritized and, if necessary, passed on to colleagues, for example. This could be useful, at least in my spare time, especially when drawing up study schedules. On the other hand, Todoist would certainly also serve as an electronic calendar template for our home hospital. Another social media tool that enhances teamwork could be the Slack communication tool. Slack would make it possible to streamline and facilitate team communication. For example, Slack could be a workable solution as a tool for communicating and developing home hospital responsibilities and team issues.

The iAuditior checklist tool can be used in any field. In the care sector, different checklists increase patient safety and occupational safety. In a home hospital, checklists could be compiled, for example, for medication, patient follow-up, registration, follow-up planning, and occupational safety.

The pros and cons of social media

It is easy and effortless to communicate with friends, relatives and acquaintances through social media. In general, people use social media for their own entertainment and to pass time. Both business and private network can benefit from social media. A single publication can reach a large number of people in a short period of time using variety of digital platforms. Entrepreneurs in particular benefit from this marketing tool and the customer relationships it creates. Social media offers a lot of inspiration and ideas to it´s users.

You can easily get hooked on social media, in which case the use exceeds reasonableness and one can talk about addiction to social media. Social media can easily create unrealistic expectations about life and relationships. It also makes it easier to bully online, as offensive comments can be left anonymously. Everyone who uses social media should be aware of its risks especially young people. You should understand that by postin your picture online it will remain there for a long long time. Pictures can end up in the wrong hands and they could be used in scams for example. You should also be careful when sharing your personal information online because it make it easy for a hacker to use that information to commite identity theft. Scammer also use sosial media for marketing at any time of the day. The ads look real, but through the ad you end up on a scam site where you lose your money by ordering goods.

Social media offers its best if used wisely and within reasonable limits. It is important to have a certain reservation about the content of social media sites. When you don’t compare yourself to others and can learn to coexist with fellow people without misunderstanding them, social media is a nice added spice to your life.

Self-evaluation

I became acquainted with many new applications and social media tools through this assignment. I found the task interesting and meaningful. I also learned that there are variety of social media tools for every different purpose and situation. All the applications are not equally as functional and fit for the purpose they are made for. But surely through experimentation you would find some applications that would fit your needs both in work and spare time.