Editorial: Facing a new frontier: safety in cyberspace and challenges for nursing

Abstract

For most of us, the home is considered to be our castle: when we close the doors, it is our equivalent to pulling up the drawbridge, thereby retreating from the outside world. But more often, there is no retreat from the outside community—we may have interactive televisions, mobile phones, and computers that are connected to the Internet by cables or wireless technology. Nursing is already evolving to encompass the new advances that innovations in information technologies bring to health care. Among the many developments are telenursing, telemedicine, online health and specialist help groups, cyberspace hospitals, and health care applications for mobile phones. As nurses, we are embracing the technological age. But, as with any change, advances mean new challenges, rethinking definitions, and development of new theoretical knowledge and ways of delivering care to meet the health needs of individuals, families, and communities