PDA's and Pocket PC's Influence

¶ … PDA's and Pocket PC's Influence Medical Practices The era of the Dot.com has come to an end. Customers are no longer enamored of new and snazzy technical gadgets. So too is their reluctance with snapping up the newer versions of software that are flooding the markets.

There are reports that there has been a full stop to the purchasing of products and services all around without the comprehension of the exact benefits that they would derive and the impact of these products and services on the bottom line and whether this would be in keeping with the overall business objectives. This has caused a reversal of fortunes for the computer companies and there has been a realization that a lot of effort is needed to find fresh revenue generating markets and invigorate the old markets.

It is in Health care that these companies have found the fresh market that they were looking for to generate revenues that were not coming in. Health care was one segment of industry that was slow in going in for information technology and still has to go along way in embracing this new technology and thereby automating its most fundamental processes.

(What's New in Mobile Computing for Healthcare?) The exuberance that the information technology companies in the Health care industry has caused them to come out with a plethora of hardware and software in an attempt to woo this segment of industry. It would be naive to say that these efforts of the information technology companies have not paid off. There are several forces at work within the medical fraternity that have been taken up with the new flow of hardware and software products from the information technology companies.

This has therefore caused an intensified effort in the medical community to have a fresh look at these hardware's and software's and the way that they could be utilized in keeping with objectives of Health care of providing care to their patients in the most effective manner. There are two products from the information technology companies that are a part of this stirring in the medical community for the more effective use of information technology and these two products are the PDA's and the Pocket PCs.

(What's New in Mobile Computing for Healthcare) The prediction of experts is that in the next few years most of the doctors would already have started using or will start using hand held computing devices like the PDA's or Pocket PCs as a very much integral part of the effective tools that they use in their daily practice.

The areas of use that are being predicted as the first places where these tools of the information technologies will come into effect are in the tracking and updating of patient medical records for the prescription of suitable modes of treatment and for billing and management of their practice.

The trend of use is definitely moving in this direction but it is expected that it will take a few more years before the full utility of these information technology devices are in full use as the pace of change to these devices suggest. It is assessed that a quarter of the medical community have already started using some form of handheld devices in their daily activities and these handheld devices include PDA's and Pocket PCs.

There are still many of these doctors that are using them for their personal purposes but there is a growing trend to incorporate these devices into their professional activities also.

(Usage Higher Among Doctors Who Are Young, Hospital-Based or with Large Practices) The trend seen also seems to indicate that the younger doctors are not bothered about this change that is coming about in their integral practice activity and are showing an increased trend in their use while the older doctors are more resistant towards the changes occurring in their mode of functioning and this is only to be expected.

A larger use of these hand held devices are seen among the doctors that are fully hospital-based or have at least some part of their health care activities related to a hospital, than those doctors who are mostly office based in their practice. Again greater use of these hand held devices including PDA's and Pocket PCs are seen in doctors that are in large practices than those doctors who practice alone or in small groups.

(Usage Higher Among Doctors Who Are Young, Hospital-Based or with Large Practices) An examination in brief provides the necessary clarity to the increased use of PDA's and Pocket PCs in the medical community. The entry of the PDA's and the Patient Keeper software has given the service providers in the Health care segment of industry a powerful information technology tool that enables them to lessen the amount of paper work that is involved in providing Health care services to patients and thereby causing quicker attention to the patient.

The PDA's with the Patient Keeper software also makes it easier to access information regarding the patient from the labs, statistics and any other relevant information without the medical community staff having to move personally and collect them from those respective repositories. (Duke Caregivers Leveraging PDAs for Patient Care) The Pocket PCs are planned to be used across almost fifty sites in the far flung areas of Australia as a part of their patient management system and has been welcomed by the Health care service providers.

The software for these Pocket PCs will be sourced from a Brisbane-based software company Lukeman that has developed mobile automated software for the home health care market. The Lukeman software will enable the users of Pocket PCs to maintain process and disseminate the information that would be collected from the field by home visits. These activities were so far done manually which was laborious in that all these records were created on paper.

Pocket PCs advance on Palm) The rapid advances in information technology have enabled an explosion in wireless and mobile technology that is making quick inroads into the Heath care service providers market. This is happening simply because it enables the doctors to perform their duties in providing medical care in a quicker and more efficient manner.

The mobile medical technologies in the form of PDA's and PCS when seamlessly integrated with the healthcare enterprise information technology infrastructure provides excellent support to the medical professionals by providing a lot of assistance to the complex decision making processes that are inherent with their professional functions. This is made possible by these hand held devices allowing access to the large amounts of stored relevant information that provide significant assistance to the critical decision making that takes place at the point at which the medical care is being provided.

Therefore these decisions become informed decisions and the PDA's and Pocket PC's again become handy in allowing the medical care professionals to act on these decisions by using them. (the pulse of health care is wireless: The future medical enterprise) PDA's and Pocket PCs thus enable not only the improvement of the quality in the professional work of the medical care professionals but also their efficiency in the completion of their administrative functions.

The benefits that accrue from integrating the health care enterprise with the PDA's and the Pocket PCs are several and these include providing for safer and faster health care. With information that can be accessed from a Pocket PC or a PDA the doctors on call will be able to make more informed decision from wherever they are to the point at which the medical care has to be provided. The next benefit is the more effective capture of charges for the services that have been provided.

This is especially useful in the critical care practice provided by hospitals or ambulatory medical care service providers. The Voice over Internet Protocol facility provides the next benefit in that it enables the nurse to physician or physician to physician without any loss in time for the effective providing of medical care. (the pulse of health care is wireless: The future medical enterprise) The next benefit comes from fewer medical errors.

The prescription coming from a PDA or Pocket PC with the assistance of electronic formularies and drug references will lead to reduction in formulary errors and this will lead to more successful results for the patients requiring medical care. The next benefit arises from the better care that better knowledge provides. The handheld devices provide assistance to access the gold standard knowledge which enables doctors to make more evidence-based decisions in their practice.

The final benefit that comes from these handheld devices is their capacity to disseminate information that is of significant important. Thus from an enterprise point-of-view significantly important information can be disseminated to improve the workflow of the enterprise. Yet another way that these handheld devices could be used is in the field of training in the medical care field.

This can be gauged from the fact that the use of Pocket PCs or PDA's are being encouraged in many of the residency programs with many of the residents being provided with stipends to purchase these hand held devices. (the pulse of health care is wireless: The future medical enterprise) The Pocket PCs and the PDA's are just only the tools but it is the software that drive these hand held devices that allow for providing better health care services.

Starting from an individual medical practitioner and moving on to the communities of professional the use of these hand held devices allow them to work cooperating with each other and through the health care enterprise. The Electronic Medical Records - EMR, Clinical Drug.