The NNN Formalization: Review and Development of Guideline Specification in the Care Domain

TL;DR

This paper introduces a formalization of the NNN standards to support the creation and adaptation of patient care processes, aiming to improve flexibility and completeness in clinical guideline application.

Contribution

It develops a novel formalization of NNN knowledge tailored for semi-automatic care process support, considering existing standards and evaluating with a case study.

Findings

Formalization enhances process adaptability

Evaluation shows improved support for nursing tasks

Case study validates the approach's effectiveness

Abstract

Due to an ageing society, it can be expected that less nursing personnel will be responsible for an increasing number of patients in the future. One way to address this challenge is to provide system-based support for nursing personnel in creating, executing, and adapting patient care processes. In care practice, these processes are following the general care process definition and individually specified according to patient-specific data as well as diagnoses and guidelines from the NANDA, NIC, and NOC (NNN) standards. In addition, adaptations to running patient processes become necessary frequently and are to be conducted by nursing personnel including NNN knowledge. In order to provide semi-automatic support for design and adaption of care processes, a formalization of NNN knowledge is indispensable. This technical report presents the NNN formalization that is developed targeting at goals such as completeness, flexibility, and later exploitation for creating and adapting patient care processes. The formalization also takes into consideration an extensive evaluation of existing formalization standards for clinical guidelines. The NNN formalization as well as its usage are evaluated based on case study FATIGUE.