Despite the fact that computer use in health care and nursing is burgeoning, nurses often find that they have inadequate tools with which to manage information about complex phenomena. Family is one such complex phenomenon of interest to nurses. Commonly used computer tools for managing information about families may not be congruent with the ways that individuals define their families and may not be consistent with nursing conceptualization of families as dynamic groups not necessarily limited to biologically related individuals. Building nursing knowledge on incongruent conceptualizations will result in inaccurate knowledge. Communication and collaboration between nurse researchers, clinicians, and nursing informatics researchers are needed in order to produce tools that are consistent with nursing conceptualization and that will support nursing research and practice.
KeywordsFamily health; Assessment of patient/family; Information systems; Computers/technology; Family history; Knowledge representation; Nursing informaticsThe use of computers in health care and nursing is growing, as is the amount of information available and necessary for nursing research and practice. The increasing use of electronic health records (EHRs) and the proliferating availability of electronic health information indicate that the use of and reliance on computers in health care will continue to expand. Nursing has a valuable opportunity and an important responsibility to ensure that information is managed in computers in ways supportive of nursing research and practice.The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the pressing need for computational tools that are consistent with nursing conceptualization. By reviewing how nursing knowledge is captured in computers, exploring the complex concept of family, and comparing and contrasting the concept of family with computational tools commonly used within health care to manage information about families, we aim to depict the chasm between nursing conceptualization about family and the tools currently available to help nurses manage information about family in research and practice. We will critically examine how congruence or incongruence between the conceptualization and representation of complex concepts such as family can impact nurse researchers and clinicians. We will conclude by envisioning how computer tools based on nursing conceptualization might be developed, how they could benefit nurses and persons address for reprints: Jane Peace, PhD(c), H6/296 Clinical Sciences Center,