I work as a nurse specializing in psychiatry. In my work, I talk with people and my most important tools are my own ears and my own mouth. Regarding digital tools, I mainly use the patient information system and different parts of the Microsoft Office package. On a daily basis, I use Teams to communicate with colleagues and to share and save files. I also use Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint every day, and I find using them easy and effortless, especially when a whole bunch of programs works with one login. I changed to my current job after the worst phase of the Covid pandemic, but I have talked with my colleagues about what work was like before the pandemic. Daily meetings were held face-to-face in conference rooms or common rooms and patients were mainly always met face-to-face. In my opinion, Covid has brought positive aspects to these “traditional” ways of working and given flexibility to work. Remote work opportunities have also improved.
In general, digital tools are used to some extent in the care sector. Moodle platforms to support professional development, the Kanta archive, training through various applications and also the services found in databases are often used. Terveykylä’s digital services are also familiar through work, as well as Kuopio University Hospital’s OmaKys service.
I don’t use social media tools in my work. Actually, I have to be careful with my personal social media usage so as not to compromise my own or my clients’ security or privacy regulations. I keep pretty strict limits on what information I share publicly on social media. However, the hospital where I work has active social media accounts and I follow them myself, e.g. on Instagram.
LinkedIn could also be suitable for the health care sector to support recruitment. There is a severe shortage of nurses and the recruitment processes are long, so any relief would be welcome. LinkedIn is a professional network on the internet. There you can present your skills, network and look for jobs or employees. I’ve heard about the site and visited it, but I don’t have my own profile.
Miro
Miro is a digital, real-time whiteboard to support meetings and looks good especially for larger meetings. Making presentations seems convenient and different colourful presentations make it interesting.
Todoist
Todoist presents itself on its website as “the world’s most popular task management and to-do list application”. I’ve never used this application myself, and I’m not quite sure how it would fit into healthcare teamwork, but since I like to-do lists myself, I would think that this would also at least have features suitable for my own work. At the moment, all the lists and to-do’s can be found in a traditional, paper calendar, and I can’t even imagine what would happen if that calendar were to disappear.
Signal
Since data protection and information security play an important role in healthcare, instant messaging applications have been a challenge. Whatsapp, Facebook messenger etc. are bad for communication with colleagues due to their security. Signal’s Encryption (powered by the open source Signal Protocol) keeps your conversations secure. Signal promises not to listen in on calls or read messages and guarantees that no one else can either.
YouTube
In my own work, I have used YouTube, but the possibilities of using it would be much wider. Especially when going through their issues with patients, it would be possible to find material to support the discussions on a large scale via YouTube. Of course, source criticality must be taken into account here as well, and only generally known content providers whose videos comply with healthcare guidelines and regulations should be used.
Opportunities and challenges of social media
While thinking about this question, the thought came to me that there are certainly at least as many challenges, if not more, than opportunities. Social media enables an easy and quick way to keep in touch with friends and relatives and, for example, communication abroad is also free via social media. Social media can be used to combat loneliness and create new friendships. This also involves risks, because you cannot be completely sure who is writing behind the screen. As a parent, you often think about this with a growing child, even if my own child doesn’t use social media yet. In the future, as the child grows up, I feel a great responsibility to ensure that the child uses social media safely.
Social media has both positive and negative effects on working life. Videos, pictures and exposure create transparency and increase trust in operators. Social media is fast and it reaches a large number of people effortlessly. Healthcare is a challenging industry and sharing things on social media requires great caution. In addition, issues related to information security are important. Sometimes I get contacts from my patients on social media, but I have ignored them and discussed the matter with the patients later and explained to them that I want to keep a line between my civil life and my working life.
I follow a lot of health professionals on social media, but sometimes I feel like I would like to stay away from work in my free time. However, sometimes, when I myself need help with e.g. health issues of family members, I often find an answer or instructions through social media. This also has its risks, because people often tell things based on their own experiences and the instructions can be completely opposite to the national recommendations. Criticality of sources, own judgment and own knowledge are therefore actively used in these situations.
Being available is tough sometimes. Social media users are used to quick response and that is also expected from companies’ social media channels. It is good for companies to announce on social media that e.g. health companies do not respond to health questions sent in messages.
In my work, I have noticed that other companies no longer update their websites, but all the information can be found on e.g. Facebook pages. I can’t access Facebook from my workplace computer and I often have to use my own phone with patients to find information, which is where I think the line between work and personal life gets blurred.
Self evaluation
I am a quick learner and quite fluent in using different tools and social media channels. However, there are a lot of digital tools at work and they are constantly changing, so there is no point in expecting perfect competence of anyone. While writing this assignment, I noticed that even though I have had the feeling that there are a lot of digital tools, their use is still quite low compared to, for example, companies in the technology and trade sectors or even medical care in other specialities. I would like clear instructions and training on the use of digital tools from my employer, because a large part of my colleagues are not so well informed about safety instructions and it may be that the security holes are precisely in these users.
With the help of social media, you can get information quickly and stay up to date with world events, but sometimes I wish it wasn’t so necessary to be up to date on everything.
Digital tools and social media have definitely made studies easier. When ten years have passed since the previous studies, it’s refreshing that you don’t have to go to the library all the time and you can get in touch with school friends conveniently and quickly. On the other hand, your own problem-solving skills are also often left unused when you get a quick answer from friends or support services.