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Standardized care plans have the potential to enhance the quality of nursing records in terms of content and completeness, thereby better supporting workflow, easing the documentation process, facilitating continuity of care, and permitting systematic data gathering to build evidence from practice. Despite these potential benefits, there may be challenges associated with the successful adoption and use of standardized care plans in municipal healthcare information practices. Using a participatory approach, two workshops were conducted with nurses and nursing leaders (n = 11) in two Norwegian municipalities, with the objective of identifying success criteria for the adoption and integration of standardized care plans into practice. Three themes were found to describe the identified success criteria: (1) "facilitating system level support for nurses' workflow"; (2) "engaged individuals creating a culture for using standardized care plans"; and (3) "developing system level safety nets." The findings suggest success criteria that could be useful to address to facilitate the integration of standardized care plans in municipal healthcare information practice and provide useful knowledge for those working with implementation and further development of standardized care plans., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.)

Aims and Objectives: To explore how nurses use standardised care plans as a new recording tool in municipal health care, and to identify their thoughts and opinions., Background: In spite of being an important information source for nurses, care plans have repeatedly been found unsatisfactory. Structuring and coding information through standardised care plans is expected to raise the quality of recorded information, improve overviews, support evidence-based practice and facilitate data aggregation. Previous research on this topic has mostly focused on the hospital setting. There is a lack of knowledge on how standardised care plans are used as a recording tool in the municipal healthcare setting., Design: An exploratory design with a qualitative approach using three qualitative methods of data collection. The study complied with the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research., Methods: Empirical data were collected in three Norwegian municipalities through participant observation and individual interviews with 17 registered nurses. In addition, we collected nursing records from 20 electronic patient records., Results: Use of standardised care plans was influenced by the nurses' consideration of their benefits. Partial implementation created an opportunity for nonuse. There was no consensus regarding how much information to include, and the standardised care plans could become both short and generic, and long and comprehensive. The themes "balancing between the old and the new care planning system," "considering the usefulness of standardised care plans as a source of information" and "balancing between overview and detail" reflect these findings., Conclusions: Nurses' use of standardised care plans was influenced by the plans' partial implementation, their views on usefulness and their personal views on the detail required in a care plan., Relevance to Clinical Practice: The structuring of nursing records is a fast-growing trend in health care. This study gives valuable information for those attempting to implement such structures in municipal health care., (© 2020 The Authors. Journal of Clinical Nursing published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)