Nurse leaders should leverage both virtual nursing and multidisciplinary care teams to remove burdens from the bedside nurse, say these nurse leaders.
Virtual nursing will continue to become the standard of care in health systems across the industry.
However, there are still several roadblocks that stand in the way of virtual nursing becoming the perfect solution for staffing and care delivery issues.
The HealthLeaders 2025 Virtual Nursing Mastermind program participants met earlier this week in Atlanta to discuss their virtual nursing programs and the outcomes they have achieved so far. There are two key points that CNOs can take back to their health systems to help fine tune their own virtual nursing programs.
Involving multidisciplinary teams
From the beginning, the selling point for virtual nursing has been that it will remove burdens from the bedside and give time back to nurses. However, the Mastermind participants made it clear that virtual nursing is not going to solve every problem that nurses are facing in the industry. Nurses are burnt out, and while the addition of a virtual nurse can help offload administrative tasks such as admissions and discharges, there are still plenty of tasks that could be outsourced to other departments in a heath system.
Since nursing is the largest part of the workforce, it has become easy to pass things off to nurses. However, according to Derek Godino, senior program director of nursing at Geisinger and Mastermind participant, nurses should be able to rely on multidisciplinary teams to support them and remove some of their burden. The participants emphasized that not every task currently being completed by a nurse needs to necessarily be done by RNs.
To Godino, it's time to reimagine workflows at a system level.
"We have to disrupt the health system model, not individual care team models," Godino said.
To the participants, leaders should consider relocating tasks to multidisciplinary teams in addition to assigning them to virtual nurses. CNOs and other nurse leaders should also look at other industries to see how they are successfully integrating technology and try to adapt some of those strategies into their own healthcare workflows.
Reimagining the bedside model
The second takeaway from the participants is that the traditional models of care at the bedside are no longer going to be enough to sustain nursing. The nursing shortage will continue unless nurse leaders are able to incentivize people to become nurses and stay in the workforce. Virtual nursing can be one solution for that, along with incorporating other technologies such as AI and ambient listening that can further remove tasks and documentation burdens.
According to Stephanie Johnson, executive director of system virtual care for UnityPoint Health and Mastermind participant, CNEs, CNOs, and other nurse leaders must advocate for investment in technology as tools that will allow nursing to continue as a profession. The pitfalls of not investing in technology will greatly outweigh the potential savings.
"The CNE needs to be able to envision virtual nursing and other augmented resources as the way in which we will remain viable as a nursing workforce," Johnson said.
To the participants, an ideal virtual nursing program would involve consolidated technology with a streamlined user interface that allows the nurse to follow the patient throughout their entire care journey. It would take into account best nursing practices, get other disciplines involved, and ultimately enable nurses to do their jobs more efficiently and effectively, while recentering their time with patients as the focal point of the profession.
There's more to come from the 2025 Virtual Nursing Mastermind program, so stay tuned for more coverage and the final report.
The HealthLeaders Mastermind seriesis an exclusive series of calls and events with healthcare executives. This Virtual NursingMastermind series features ideas, solutions, and insights onaccelerating your virtual nursing program.Please join the community at our LinkedIn page.
To inquire about participating in an upcoming Mastermind series or attending a HealthLeaders Exchange event, email us at exchange@healthleadersmedia.com.
CNOs should partner with their technology leaders and IT departments, according to this ANO.
On this episode of HL Shorts, we hear from Sandy Alexander, associate nursing officer at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, about how CNOs can choose the right technology for their virtual nursing programs. Tune in to hear her insights.
Health systems are debating the future of virtual care technology and what expanding into other departments would look like in practice.
The 2025 HealthLeaders Virtual Nursing Mastermind program participants are meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, to discuss implementing virtual nursing programs and what the future of those programs will look like.
The program consists of CNOs and other nurse and technology leaders from influential health systems across the country who are all at various stages in their virtual nursing journeys, and who are innovating with new technologies and solutions.
The technology dilemma
Since last year's run of this Mastermind program, the participants have made great strides toward integrating virtual nursing into care delivery. However, it's clear that virtual care is expanding well beyond nursing, and other departments want in on the action.
One major issue that many of them are facing is the lack of consolidation of the technology being used in the workflows. With a vast array of technology options, it can be difficult to decide which ones will suit the needs of each nursing workforce and each patient population. Those decisions get even more difficult when factoring in the other disciplines who want to use the technology.
If other departments do begin leveraging the virtual care platforms, the question arises: Who gets priority?
The pros and cons
For many of the participants, virtual care tech largely lives within the nursing department, but there are many avenues that could be taken to incorporate use from other staff.
Expanding access to the tech could cause confusion around who gets to enter the patient's room at what time, and it could potentially conflict with the bedside nurse's time with the patient. This would also create a need to manage those interactions, which could potentially be solved by a queuing system based on priority.
The upside, however, is that shared access to virtual care technology would allow for more disciplines to take on tasks that are typically done by nurses. It could save time for nurses at the bedside and provide the patient with a higher quality of care.
There are still plenty of questions to be answered regarding the future virtual nursing, so stay tuned for more coverage.
The HealthLeaders Mastermind seriesis an exclusive series of calls and events with healthcare executives. This Virtual NursingMastermind series features ideas, solutions, and insights onaccelerating your virtual nursing program.Please join the community at our LinkedIn page.
To inquire about participating in an upcoming Mastermind series or attending a HealthLeaders Exchange event, email us at exchange@healthleadersmedia.com.
The 2025 Virtual Nursing Mastermind program is well underway as participants brainstorm the future and potential of virtual nursing.
As healthcare technologies progress, virtual nursing is becoming the standard of care throughout health systems across the country.
In systems big and small, nurse and innovation leaders are making strides to integrate technology into nursing in ways that will benefit nurses, patients, and their families, while remaining cost effective.
The HealthLeaders Virtual Nursing Mastermind is now in its second year of the program. The participating health systems are meeting this week, from March 17-18, in Atlanta to discuss how far they've come in their virtual nursing programs and where they are going next.
Where it started
In 2024, according to the program final report, the goals of each health system were to improve the nursing workflows on a broader scale, and to address workforce shortages and burnout. Nurses are heavily burdened with administrative tasks that take away time spent with their patients, and virtual nursing can help remove many of those tasks.
According to the program survey last year, 72 % of the health systems reporting being in the early (36%) to mid-stages (36%) of their virtual nursing journeys, with only 27 % reporting being in the mature stage. The early stage is when a program is still in ideation and testing, the mid-stage is when there is some adoption and promising outcomes, and program maturity is reached when a program is becoming systemwide.
For most of the participants (91%) in 2024, virtual nursing had an impact on their medical surgical departments, followed by the ICU (64%), behavioral (18%) and chronic care (18%) departments, outpatient (9%), rehab (9%), and ED/follow up (9%).
The response was overwhelmingly positive from staff, patients, and leadership. While 89% of the participants reported less than 5% of the nursing budget being attributed to virtual nursing, 80 % of participants also reported they expect their health systems’ virtual nursing labor budget to increase between 10% and 25% over the next three years.
Where it's going
This year, many of the returning participants as well as the new health systems in the program are much further along in their virtual nursing journeys. While many began with carts, several have moved toward in-room technology with built-in cameras and televisions. The goal now is to consolidate technology to optimize the experience for both nurses and patients.
AI has a bright future in virtual care. The participants what to incorporate ambient listening technology into patient rooms for verbal documentation and, where possible, into the electronic medical record (EMR). AI has the potential to optimize tasks, such as searching for information in the EMR.
The participants also have plans to expand virtual care technology beyond just med surge units and nursing. Many want to expand into the emergency department, which has several roadblocks, as well as acute care at home programs. For the virtual nurses themselves, several organizations want to make working from home a viable option, rather than having all the virtual nurses in a centralized location.
There is much more to come from the 2025 Virtual Nursing Mastermind program, so stay tuned for more coverage.
The HealthLeaders Mastermind series is an exclusive series of calls and events with healthcare executives focusing on pain points that matter most to you. This Virtual Nursing Mastermind series features ideas, solutions, and insights into excelling your virtual nursing program.
To inquire about participating in an upcoming Mastermind series or attending a HealthLeaders Exchange event, email us at anorris@healthleadersmedia.com.
Nurse leaders need to focus on getting nurses engaged early in their careers, according to this CNO.
Dr. Amanda B. Shrout is a seasoned nursing executive with extensive expertise in clinical care, evidence-based practice, and leadership.
With a Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) from Ohio State University, Dr. Shrout has led efforts to improve nursing outcomes through evidence-based initiatives, policy development, and a collaborative leadership style.
In the nearly 10 years she has been a part of the team at LifeBridge Health, Shrout has taken on roles of increasing responsibility, including clinical nurse specialist, director of clinical excellence, director of emergency departments and observation, and most recently, interim chief nursing officer.
Now, Shrout serves as vice president of patient care services and chief nursing officer at Sinai Hospital & Grace Medical Center in Baltimore, Maryland. There, she has driven significant advancements in patient care and nursing leadership.
On our latest installment of The Exec, HealthLeaders sat down with Shrout to discuss her journey into nursing, and her thoughts on trends in the nursing industry. Tune in to hear her insights.
CNOs and other nurse leaders should be aware of these two pieces of legislation.
So far, 2025 has been a year of chaos for healthcare.
The future of the industry seems uncertain, with large clinical staff strikes and a federal administration that pushes new executive orders on a daily basis.
Now more than ever, it's critical that CNOs and other nurse leaders get involved and advocate for nursing policy. Recently, two bills have come to the forefront: the PRECEPT Nurses Act, and the I CAN Act.
The PRECEPT Nurses Act
The Providing Real-World Education and Clinical Experience by Precepting Tomorrow’s (PRECEPT) Nurses Act is a bipartisan bill introduced by Congresswoman Jen Kiggans (VA-02), and it seeks to provide a $2,000 tax credit for nurses who serve as clinical preceptors to nursing students, according to a press release. The goal is to address the nursing shortage by increasing the amount of nursing students who can complete their clinical training under nurse preceptors.
“Mentors are the backbone of nurturing talent and shaping the workforce of tomorrow, and in nursing, preceptors fulfill this essential role,” said Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, president of the American Nurses Association, in the press release. “The PRECEPT Nurses Act is an important step in recognizing the invaluable contributions of nurse preceptors and ensuring they have the support needed to address critical workforce shortages, particularly in underserved areas.
The I CAN Act
The Improving Care and Access to Nurses (I CAN) Act is another bipartisan bill that would remove the federal barriers in Medicare and Medicaid programs that stop APRNs from practicing to the full extent of their clinical education and training, according to another press release. Representatives Dave Joyce (OH-14), Suzanne Bonamici (OR-01), Jen Kiggans (VA-02), and Lauren Underwood (IL-14) and Senators Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) introduced the bill with the goal of increasing patient access to healthcare while lowering costs and improving quality.
“The reintroduction of this bill is a critical step toward expanding health care access across the country," Mensik Kennedy said in the press release. "By removing outdated barriers, it empowers APRNs to provide the care they are trained for—especially in rural and underserved communities where they are often the primary providers."
Here is what CNOs need to know about these two bills.
Preventing workplace violence takes a collaborative effort, says this CNO.
On this episode of HL Shorts, we hear from Linsey Paul, CNO for the Mercy Health Lima Market, about how CNOs can strategize to prevent workplace violence. Tune in to hear her insights.
Virtual nursing is becoming the standard of care, and nurse leaders must prepare for the next evolution.
In the latest edition of HealthLeaders' The Winning Edge webinar series, a panel of nurse leaders discussed what additional technologies can be integrated into your virtual nursing program, and how to optimize it to best support the bedside nurse and be cost effective.
The discussion included four key takeaways: how to individualize the program for the needs of your health system, get nurses involved, choose the right technology, and make the financial case with ROI metrics.
While health systems might be at different stages of implementation, there are several key virtual nursing strategies that CNOs should take into consideration.
Virtual nursing has spread far and wide throughout health systems across the country as it becomes a critical component of patient care, and it's gaining buy-in from nurse leaders everywhere.
While health systems might have different approaches or be at different stages of implementation, there are several common virtual nursing strategies that CNOs should take into consideration.
The panel discussion included four key points about virtual nursing strategy.
Individualize the program
First and foremost, virtual nursing programs should be individualized to fit the needs of a health system. CNOs can begin this process by identifying the problems that the program will work to address, and narrowing down the specific needs of the nurses, patients, and other staff who will be impacted by the program.
Some common goals for virtual nursing include reducing time spent completing administrative tasks such as admissions and discharges, and giving time back to bedside nurses. During a time when nursing shortages are growing, and patient acuity is greater, it's essential that unnecessary tasks and high workload burdens be removed from nurses so they can spend their time caring for patients.
Virtual nursing can offer an avenue for nurses who want to retire or who can't work at the bedside anymore to continue sharing their knowledge and participating in care delivery. Those nurses can then mentor novice nurses as well.
Get nurses involved
The first half of the equation with virtual nursing is the nursing workforce, and getting nurse buy-in is essential. While there might be caution surrounding virtual nursing and its implications, it's up to the CNO to show the positive benefits on both staffing and patients and to bring the nurses into the conversation.
Nurses are well equipped to give the best feedback about workflows and input on what they need to make their jobs easier. Nurses can also help get the word out quickly about new programs, which can greatly help with program adoption, and they can help with testing and troubleshooting. It's important that CNOs listen to the needs of the nurses and work with them to implement the best solutions.
Choose the right technology
The second half of the equation is the virtual nursing technology itself. Determining the right technology for a virtual nursing program begins with having a strong partnership with IT departments and innovation leaders. That partnership creates a strong feedback loop where nurses can help the IT project managers understand what needs to be done, and the IT department can work towards achieving those goals. CNOs should also lean heavily on their CNIOs, since they are able to blend nursing and technology together to come up with the best outcomes.
When selecting what technology to use, CNOs should pilot different technologies and give themselves plenty of time to test things with the understanding that it might not work the first time. The beginning stage of any virtual nursing program offers tremendous learning opportunities. Choosing between carts or fixed, in-room technology will depend heavily on the needs of the department, the nursing unit, and the patients and staff involved.
Make the case
Lastly, CNOs must be able to make a financial case for virtual nursing. This can be difficult because many virtual nursing ROI metrics are considered "soft" metrics, that save "soft dollars." However, there are several concrete metrics that CNOs can look at for positive outcomes, such as reduced admission and discharge times, and better recruitment and retention numbers. Improving discharge information and discharge planning can help reduce readmissions as well.
Other metrics can include nurse engagement, patient experience, and care quality metrics. Patient outcome metrics, such as fall prevention, can also be impacted by virtual nursing, especially with the incorporation of additional technologies. Improving patient outcomes helps reduce costs from negative outcomes.
