Reviews article
Digital Technologies in Nursing Care: A Review of Deployment Pathways, Clinical Adaptation, and Innovation Trends
Abstract
This review examines the deployment pathways, clinical adaptation dynamics, and innovation trends of digital technologies in nursing care from 2018 to 2026. Drawing on 96 studies identified through a systematic search across six databases, the review applies the N-DEPLOY (Nursing Digital Deployment and Localized Optimization Yield) framework, organized across four dimensions: clinical workflow compatibility, human-machine collaboration trust, institutional readiness, and evidence-to-deployment fidelity. Six thematic clusters are analyzed: nursing digital infrastructure, AI and intelligent decision support, tele-nursing and wearable monitoring, nursing robotics and automation, digital twins in nursing, and nursing data security and privacy. The review identifies a persistent deployment gap: while technologies demonstrate high technical readiness in controlled settings, fewer than 20% of published studies report sustained deployment beyond pilot phases. Across four care settings, deployment maturity follows a progressive gradient from acute care (highest) to geriatric long-term care (lowest). The N-DEPLOY framework reveals that the four deployment dimensions are interdependent and must be optimized concurrently for successful nursing digitalization. The review concludes that the dominant barrier is not technology maturity but deployment readiness, and calls for a paradigm shift from technology-push to nursing-needs-pull in digital health innovation.
Keywords
References
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