title: Determining an appropriate clinical problem for expert system development in the neonatal intensive care unit.
abstract: The purpose of this pilot study was to demonstrate the use of the Nominal Group Technique (NGT) to identify a clinical problem for expert system (ES) development. NGT is a research method that allows individual judgments about a problem to be combined effectively. Problem identification is the necessary first step for the development of an expert system for use by neonatal nurse practitioners (NNPs) caring for neonates in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Five NNPs identified 21 clinical problems encountered when caring for infants in the NICU and reduced these to the 5 most amenable to ES development. Of these 5 problems, fluid management in the very low birthweight (VLBW) infant was chosen for projected ES development.
authors.affiliation: Department of Education, Administration, Health Policy, and Informatics, School of Nursing, University of Maryland at Baltimore 21201, USA.
authors.forename: T L
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Panniers
mesh_terms: D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods; D005103:Expert Systems; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007363:Intensive Care Units, Neonatal; D008873:Mid-Atlantic Region; D017283:Neonatal Nursing; D009722:Nurse Practitioners; D010865:Pilot Projects