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How OpenNotes Builds Patient Engagement

Nurse Leader Insider, May 21, 2015

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Patients are encouraged to become engaged in their healthcare, but they can't do it unless providers give them the tools and information they need to actively participate.

Everyone agrees that patient engagement is important. No one agrees on what, exactly, the term means. A 2012 study published in the Journal of Participatory Medicine, "The Many Faces of Patient Engagement," concluded that there is a lack of "consistency in terminology and definitions around the concept of patient engagement."

The presenters of a session at the HIMSS 2015 conference last month, "Shaping the Frontier of Patient Engagement: A CNO/CNIO Perspective," grapple with the nebulous nature of patient engagement. Laura J. Wood, DNP, MS, RN, who is senior vice president for patient care service and chief nursing officer at Boston (MA) Children's Hospital, and Mary Beth Mitchell, MSN, RN, BC, CPHIMS, the chief nursing informatics officer at Texas Health Resources in Arlington, TX, discussed the CNO and CNIO perspectives on the evolution of patient engagement.

Despite the debate over definition and application of patient engagement, Mitchell boils it down to a single, simple description: "It's how patients become invested in their own health."

Read the rest of this article at HealthLeaders Media here.

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