Investigation of the information health literacy and information behavior of ICU nurses during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Introduction: The information health literacy and information seeking-behavior of health professionals, as well as the training
at the level of information systems, is a key factor in the proper management of an ever-increasing volume of information
concerning users of health services. In particular, the adequate and valid informational training of nurses leads to quality
provision of health services, through the correct decision-making and execution of tasks.
Aim: The study of the digital health information education and the informational behavior of the nursing staff of GHT
«Papageorgiou» during the covid-19 pandemic.
Material and Method: The research was implemented in May 2021 while the sample of the research consisted of 70/100 nurses (70% response rate) who worked in the ICU-Covid of the “PAPAGEORGIOU” hospital. The data collection was done using the
electronic Health Literacy Scale (e-HEALS) while the recording of the information seeking-behavior was based on respective
questionnaires used to investigate the information seeking-behavior and information needs of Greek health professionals. Statistical data processing was performed with IBM SPSS 25.0.
Results: Nurses have a well-developed digital health information education and are aware of the importance of the internet, as
91.4% of participants consider the internet to be very to very useful in making decisions, 100% consider the ability to access online resources to be very to very important, while 57.1% are very to very satisfied with the current ability to search for scientific
information. In addition, they need information on issues related to their work as skills and nursing interventions (95.8%), nursing instructions and protocols (94.3%), nursing assessment and patient evaluation (92.9%), emergency patient management (90%), psychological support of the patient (80%) and knowledge update (78.6%) while main sources of information were
the medical (97.1%) and nursing staff (98.6%), scientific medical websites (97.1%), websites of government agencies (94.2%)
and the internet (91.4%). Finally, the main obstacles in the search for information were the lack of staff time (84.3%) and costs
(69.6%).
Conclusions: The continuous update and information of the nursing staff are important factors in maintaining and improving
the level of provision of health services. Secure information search environment but also the creation of staff training programs
on information seeking-behavior issues.