Background and Aim: With the advancement of information and communication technology, telehealth has rapidly emerged as a new approach to delivering health-related care. Telenursing, a subset of telehealth, allows nurses to coordinate and manage care using communication technologies. Despite its significant potential, the adoption of telenursing in Iran has been limited, necessitating an examination of the factors that influence its implementation. The aim of this study is to examine the relationship between demographic characteristics, including age, gender, marital status, education level, employment history, position, hospital of service, experience with telephone interviews, experience in responding to telephone consultation requests, and knowledge and experience in using telenursing systems, with nurses’ behavioral intention to accept and use this technology.
Materials and Methods: This descriptive-analytical study was conducted in 2023 with 281 nurses from two educational hospitals affiliated with Bushehr University of Medical Sciences, utilizing a complete enumeration method. Data collection tools included a demographic information questionnaire and the Chang et al. questionnaire focusing on the behavioral intention domain. The reliability of the behavioral intention domain of the questionnaire was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, which was found to be 0.73. Data analysis was conducted using descriptive statistics, such as the mean and standard deviation, as well as inferential tests, including the Mann-Whitney U test, the Kruskal-Wallis test, and the Spearman correlation coefficient. This analysis was performed with SPSS software. A significance level of less than 0.05 was used for all tests.
Results: The mean age of the participants was 33.30±7.46 years, and most of them were female and married. A significant relationship was observed between several demographic characteristics of the nurses and their behavioral intention to adopt telenursing. marital status (r=0.13, P=0.036), experience of conducting phone interviews with patients (r=0.20, P=0.001), experience of responding to phone consultation requests from patients or families (r=0.13, P=0.028), possession of knowledge and information about telenursing (r=0.26, P<0.001), and experience using the telenursing system (r=0.3, P<0.001), were all significantly associated with behavioral intention.
Conclusion: Telenursing, as one of the modern technologies of the present century, can be an effective solution to address the challenges of the healthcare system. The results of the study showed that some individual characteristics are related to the nurses’ behavioral intention to use this technology. To promote this technology, targeted training programs and supportive policies that address these factors are necessary.
