A Powerful Research Tool

Emory nursing students and faculty have a powerful new research tool to strengthen their ability to solve problems in patient care. The Nurse’s Electronic Learning Library, or Project NeLL, is a robust and user-friendly platform created by data scientists at the School of Nursing.

Piloted by 10 nursing students in 2019–2020, Project NeLL provides a web-based suite of apps for teaching, learning, and practicing data science. It is the flagship project of the Innovation Hub in the new Emory Nursing Learning Center, which will occupy four floors of newly renovated office space in Decatur by next year.

Students at all levels are now using NeLL to capture data for capstone and dissertation topics that span care settings, geographies, different conditions, and patient populations. Given the school’s curriculum-wide emphasis on the Social Determinants of Health (SDOH), specifically eliminating health disparities, NeLL has become an invaluable tool for investigating the multitude of factors driving differences in care. 

Currently, Project NeLL includes data from across Georgia and the Emory Healthcare Network, providing access to 2.7 billion deidentified health records and representing more than 1.2 million patients. The database includes visit information, medications, procedures, orders, lab results and non-lab measures, and a multitude of standard values from nurses notes, and
much more. 

No matter its size, NeLL is as an easy-to-use portal that nurses across the country will  eventually be able to use. The portal includes several web-based apps: a big data depository, a big data dictionary, self-directed learning modules for students and nurses, and curricular bundles for faculty. Self-directed learning and teaching apps including an online course will be available soon.

“Project NeLL is unique as a data source because it is nursing centered,” says Rose Hayes, the nursing school’s director of engagement. “It’s very rare to see a database that’s inclusive of so many conditions and specialties. We purposely made NeLL easy to use so that nurses of every level leverage it as a tool for health system leadership and health care transformation.”

The School of Nursing and the American Nurses Informatics Association conducted focus group testing of NeLL in March. The NeLL team is now accepting inquiries about beta testing and is in the process of establishing test sits across Georgia and
and beyond.