A Message from Our President

The Education and Development Committee is taking the summer off and planning for new programs in the upcoming year! If you missed the "Trends" conference, feel free to check out speaker presentations in our Innovation Library ( see menu) 

A look back at Trends in Clinical Informatics: A Nursing Perspective over the years......

Themes & Progression of the Annual Symposium (2003–2026)

The symposium's evolution mirrors the broader arc of health IT and nursing informatics over two decades.

Early Years (2003–2008): Laying the Foundation

The first several symposiums focused on establishing nursing informatics as a legitimate discipline — covering standardized terminology (Virginia Saba's Clinical Care Classification), evidence-based documentation, and the basics of clinical information systems. The tone was largely introductory, building the case for why nurses needed to engage with technology.

Middle Period (2009–2014): EHR Implementation & Meaningful Use

As federal policy drove mass EHR adoption (HITECH Act, Meaningful Use), sessions shifted toward practical implementation challenges — interoperability, quality reporting, patient safety, and data ecosystems. Speakers from major health systems and federal agencies (e.g., Judy Murphy from ONC) reflected the policy-driven momentum of this era. Patient engagement and mHealth began appearing around 2013–2014, signaling early interest in connected care.

In this period NENIC also formalized recognition of nursing informatics leadership by establishing the Rita D. Zielstorff Nursing Informatics Leadership Award (first awarded beginning in 2014), honoring Rita’s pioneering work in structured nursing data, research-to-practice translation, and sustained advocacy for nurses’ voices in health IT.

Maturation (2015–2019): Optimization, Burden & Analytics

Once EHRs were widely deployed, the focus turned to what went wrong: documentation burden, clinician burnout, and usability. Themes of clinical optimization, nursing competency assessment, and data analytics became prominent. The recurring "Year in Review" research segment (often led by Andrew Phillips) established a tradition of grounding the symposium in current evidence.

Recent Years (2020–2026): AI Takes Center Stage

The most dramatic thematic shift is the near-total pivot to artificial intelligence. Beginning around 2022–2023, AI moved from a peripheral topic to the central organizing theme. By 2024–2026, the symposium title itself became "Nurses Transforming Healthcare Through Artificial Intelligence." Sessions addressed AI-assisted care plans, early warning systems, patient messaging automation, and reducing documentation burden through AI — essentially reframing the burnout problem identified in the prior era as something AI could solve.

Persistent Through-Lines

A few themes appear across nearly every era: documentation burden, patient safety, and the question of nursing's voice in technology design. Patricia Dykes and Andrew Phillips are notably recurring contributors across more than a decade, providing intellectual continuity. The consistent presence of "member highlights" also reflects an ongoing commitment to elevating frontline nurses alongside academic and executive voices.

The 2026 Spring Education session was a wonderful success!

Thank you Roberta Christopher, EdD, MSN, APRN, FNP-BC, NE-BC, EBP-C, CAIF for your presentation "Is Competence Enough?  Defining and Prioritizing Nursing Informatics Competencies for Classroom-to-Clinical Transition" .  If you missed the presentation, here are the presentation slides.  Please visit our Innovation Library for past presentations and other past presentation.

 Student Membership
NENIC is pleased to announce a special reduced membership rate for students enrolled in a nursing informatics program. To learn more about this exciting opportunity, click here. We are looking forward to an exciting new year.  We will continue to balance community updates, educational offerings, and leadership. It has been an honor to serve as NENIC President.