Electronic health records and information technology in healthcare management

¶ … Healthcare Managers and Leaders Can Use Electronic Health Information and Information Technologies to Improve the Quality

ROLE OF INDUSTRY LEADERS IN IMPROVING HIS

Using and Managing Information and Information Technologies in Healthcare

IT's role within the healthcare industry

In current times, technology actually plays a significant role in all industries and in our individual lives too. Healthcare is certainly one of the most significant industries where technology plays an important role. This induction is accountable for improving as well as saving millions of lives all over the world. Information technology has made important contributions to our world, through its relevance to the medical industry. Given the increased utilization of tele-health services, electronic medical records (EMR), smart phones and tablets, both patients and doctors are seeing the advantages brought about by these novel technologies. Medical technology has advanced because of the introduction of physicians to new devices to utilize in hospitals as well as in private practices to connecting physicians and patients several miles apart via telecommunications. In the current world, it is not unusual for patients to have video conferences with their doctors so as to save money and time usually invested on traveling to different geographical locations or immediately sent health data to any physician or specialist in any part of the world (Healthcarebusinesstech.Com, 2014). The hospital information system is intended to enhance the efficiency and management of the hospital services as well as management. A number of hospital systems have simplified hospital procedures like patient care, security, and doctor appointments among others. The increasing need and demand for such kind of software in the healthcare industry has attracted major concerns to this particular area.

Current HIPPA regulations that Healthcare IT are required to abide by While technology in the healthcare world continues to advance, rules and regulations regarding its utilization ought to be created, and modified to adapt to the new techniques of care administration. Regulations such as HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) and its Privacy and Security Act aim at the concerns regarding the privacy of patient data, together with the steps that ought to be taken to sustain confidentiality in our increasingly connected digital world. Healthcare administration and medical workers should be cautious when choosing to apply new technologies and products in their services, and must make sure that every technology is "HIPAA" prior to accepting it in their execution. Other programs such as the 2010 Health Care Reform Bill outline the measures that hospitals together with other care providers should take during the incorporation of medical technology into their services (Healthcarebusinesstech.Com, 2014).

What is needed to manage Health Records?

A health record is simply a private collection of relevant facts regarding someone's health history, with the inclusion of all past and current conditions, sicknesses, and treatments, with stress on the particular occurrences that affect the patient in the current period of care. The data recorded in the health record is developed by all healthcare experts offering care and is utilized for continuity of care. Electronic Health Record (EMR) system manages such records in digital form. The minimum tasks an EMR is meant to do, is to assist doctors in practicing better medicine as well as improve the bottom line. Some of these important tasks are, (in addition to other tasks):

Recognize and sustain a patient record: Recognize and sustain one patient record for every patient.

Manage the demographics of patients: Capture as well as sustain demographic data. Where suitable, the information ought to be clinically applicable, reportable, and traceable over time.

Manage lists of problems: Develop and sustain patient-specific lists of problems.

Manage lists of medicine: Develop and sustain patient-specific lists of medicine.

Manage history of patients: Capture, evaluate, and manage medical surgical/procedural, social, and family history, patient-reported or externally existing clinical history of the patient.

Manage clinical records and notes: Develop addend, fix, validate, and close, as required, directly-entered or recorded clinical records and notes.

Capture external clinical records: Incorporate clinical records from the external sources.

Offer care arrangements, rules, and procedures: Offer organizational rules for patient care that is suitable to support order as well as clinical records (AAFP, 2015).

Dealing with Medical Records

Health data managers shall be challenged to re-construct the means through which they manage procedures in the medical record division given the move to EMR. Numerous earlier health data systems issues could be resolved and productivity improved with imaging. The digitized documents shall permit simultaneous access to readily accessible, readable, and significant data for patient care, investigations, audits, and correspondence. The change from manual to digital documentation, however, brings several challenges. The health data managers need to supervise the transition carefully, expecting the requirements for new data and creating the necessary methods to generate them, and applying new technologies as they emerge. The present conditions are right for development in health care digital data systems. Pressures and modifications in structure in the healthcare industry need better management tools. Acknowledgement of HIS (full form) as a management tool is quickly growing amidst the health care provider society. The technology needed to recognize the EMR and improved decision support systems are available. All modules required to achieve the ends are available- - they just require coming together. With the alterations in the health care organizations, view of and requirement for information systems, medical documentation experts should draw on their skills and experience and make the change from record systems managers to health care data systems managers (Gross & Cassidy, 1992).

Managing age-old health information such as; missing documents, lost test results/imaging, missing records

The advantages of computerizing health records, workflows, and health data are massive since the data can be shared much more easily and faster, too, and additional controls could be deployed to guarantee their precision and totality. Methods for implementing this principle entail avoiding paperwork in procedures, and transferring majority of the data entry to healthcare patients. An instance of how this is accomplished is having patients enter their individual medical histories and complaints as part of their medical records via a sequence of structured questions prior to consultation with a doctor. This enhances communication amidst the patients and their doctors and it also minimizes the quantity of manual work performed by experts. Workflow data could also be computerized and deployed to allow the orchestration amidst care providers and hospitals in a more effective way, utilizing balancing algorithms (Bliemel & Hassanein, 2003).

The demand in increase and requirement to move healthcare organization to EMR systems

EMRs are latest form of recording a patient's medical record. An EMR is simply a system which has a patient's personal test results, medical history, dictations and other medical as well as financial data.

Why the move?

EMR shall enhance healthcare by improving patient care, preventative health, and provider expediency and is a great enhancement to an already improved technological healthcare industry. The execution "wave" is not taking place simply because it is a development to healthcare; however, it is also happening since it is mandated by the United States government. President Obama lately employed a stimulus package, which shall help healthcare organizations that adapt to electronic medical records (Brooks & Grotz, 2010).

Paper healthcare documents are standalone, missing the capability of integrating with other paper forms or data. The capability of integrating health records with other, disparate services, and to share the data is vital to the future of healthcare transformation. Computerized healthcare data could be integrated with numerous external and internal applications. So as to make evidence-based choices, clinicians require high quality information that must is obtained from numerous sources: outpatient and inpatient care, chronic and acute care settings, rural and urban care and populations in danger. This can be achieved only with EMRs and discrete structured information. In addition, healthcare information requires be aggregating or combining in order to get statistical relevance (Hoyt, 2015).

Authority figures broadly concur that U.S. healthcare requires improvement in several areas. To renovate its infrastructure would require extensive adoption of EMRs. Great establishments like the Veterans Health Administration and Kaiser Permanente utilize strong EMRs (VistA and Epic) which produce sufficient information to modify and improve medical practice. Kaiser Permanente reported to studies in 2009, regarding the management of bone ailments (osteoporosis) and the other regarding chronic kidney disease. They were able to illustrate that with their EMRs they could concentrate on the patients at risks and utilize all the available tools to enhance disease management and population health. With reference to Gallup poll, it is quite common for older patients to have more than a single doctor: no doctor (3%), one doctor (16%), two doctors (26%), three doctors (23%), four doctors (15%), five doctors (15%), and six or more doctors (11%). Having more than one doctor requires good communication amidst the primary care doctor, the medical expert, and the patient. The situation gets even more complicated when varying healthcare systems are required. According to a survey conducted by O'Malley et al. on 12 medical practices, in-office coordination was enhanced by EMRs; however, the technology was not mature enough to enhance coordination of care with external doctors. EMRs are being integrated with health information organizations (HIOs) in order for outpatient and inpatient data to be accessed and shared; hence enhancing communication amidst different healthcare entities is an important percept.

What role does leadership play in healthcare organizations?

Good leadership is vital for the success of an organization. In healthcare context, good leadership is more than just vital- it is certainly essential for the success of the organization. In many organizations, there exist two categories of leaders: the governing body and the chief executive officer together with other senior leaders (collectively called the "C-suite"). In case there is no coordination amidst the governing body and the senior managers, the goals of the organization are not likely to be achieved. The same applies for healthcare organizations-particularly hospitals- possess a third leadership category: the heads of the doctors and other licensed independent practitioners that offer patient care in the establishment. In a hospital, the doctors together with other licensed independent practitioners are arranged under the category of "medical personnel" and the heads of the medical personnel contribute to the management of the establishment. In the United States, this third category of leaders is exclusive; it is not present in production, banking, academic, or other service industries.

The safety as well as quality of the care offered by a healthcare organization relies on several factors. Some of the very significant ones are:

A culture that promotes safety and quality

The planning and provision of services which satisfy the patients' requirements

The presence of resources for offering care

An ample number of skilled personnel and other care providers

Ongoing assessment and enhancement of performance

Only the managers of a healthcare organization have the power, resources, and control to offer these factors. The managers (as a group) are the entities that are capable of establishing and promulgating the organization's vision, mission, and goals. The managerial group can tactically arrange for the provision of services, obtain, and distribute resources, and set priorities for better performance. And it is this group, in its leadership role, that develops the culture of the organization via their anticipations for action, words, as well as character- a culture which appreciates safe patient care, high quality, responsible utilization of resources, moral behavior, and community service; or a culture whereby these goals are not appreciated. Whereas leadership task entails strategically addressing the culture of the institution, planning and offering services, obtaining and distributing resources, offering ample personnel, and setting priorities for advancement, the mangers of the organization should also actively manage all these factors (The Governance Institute, 2009).

What role does management play in healthcare organizations?

Management is the procedure that comprises of technical and social activities and functions, taking place within organizations with the aim of meeting predetermined objectives via individuals and other resources. From the definition, a manager works through and together with other individuals, conducting interpersonal and technical activities towards meeting the objectives set forth byte organization (Buchbinder & Thompson, 2009). Others mention that a manager is any individual in the institution that supports and s accountable for the work performance of one or more individuals (Buchbinder & Thompson, 2009). Whereas many beginning learners of healthcare management tend to concentrate on the responsibility of the senior manager of an institution, it ought to be known that management happens via numerous others that might not have "manager" in their position title. Examples of such managerial positions in healthcare institutions are coordinator, supervisor, and director. Below are the responsibilities of management in HIT;

Planning: This responsibility needs the manager to set a direction and establish what he requires to get done from colleagues and support staff. It implies setting priorities and establishing performance goals

Organizing: This management responsibility refers to the general design of the institution or the particular unit, service, or division for which the manager is accountable. In addition, it entails allocating reporting relationships as well as internal interaction patterns. The major components of this role are the determination of positions, teamwork assignments, and allocation of roles and power.

Staffing: The role refers to inducting and maintaining human resources. It also refers to establishing and sustaining the labor force via certain methods and tactics.

Controlling: The role refers to supervising personnel activities and performance, as well as taking the suitable corrective actions to enhance performance.

Directing: The focus in this particular role is on instigating action in the institution via effective management and motivation of, as well as communication with the other employees.

Decision making: This particular role is proper execution of each of the stated management responsibilities and refers to making good decisions founded on consideration of both the advantages as well as limitations of the alternatives (Buchbinder & Thompson, 2009).

Roles IT plays to make sure patient data is secured

Not only is healthcare changing, but so also, is the equipment utilized to coordinate better care for the patients. With EMRs comes the chance for patients to get enhanced coordinated care from the health providers and simpler access to their health data. It is a means of making it simpler for everyone to be more knowledgeable and more involved in the health care of the patient. Nonetheless, uses of EMRs are accompanied by questions and worries regarding the security and confidentiality of health data. How is it guarded from loss, hacking (unauthorized or malicious intrusion), and theft? The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) implements security and confidentiality rules, that assist in keeping entities covered under HIPAA responsible for the confidentiality and safety of patients' health data. Even though EMRs permit providers to utilize data more efficiently to enhance the quality as well as efficacy of one's care, they do not alter the responsibilities providers have to keep one's protected health data confidential and safe. Exclusive in safeguarding the data stored in EMRs, HIPAA security regulations need health care providers to set up managerial, physical, and technical safeguards to secure the patient's health data. Certain safety measures, which might be built in to EMR systems are:

Access controls such as PIN numbers and passwords, to assist in restricting access to one's data;

Encrypting ones stored data. This implies that the patient's health data cannot be read or understood apart from by an individual that is capable of "decrypting" it, utilizing a special "key" only available to authorized/allowed people;

An audit trail that records whoever accessed your data, whatever modifications were made and when they were made.

In particular circumstances, in case an unauthorized access is made to a patient's information, federal law needs physicians, hospitals, together with other health care providers to inform you of a "violation" of your health data. This particular requirement assists patients recognize if anything has gone wrong with the security of their data and also assists in keeping the providers responsible (Rodriguez, 2011).

HIPPA regulations

Meaningful use (MU) is utilizing certified electronic health record technology to:

Enhance quality, security, efficacy, and minimize health disparities

Involve patients and family

Enhance care coordination, and population as well as public health

Sustain confidentiality and safety of patient health data

Eventually, MU observance shall most probably ensure and lead to:

Improved clinical results

Better population health results

Increased efficacy and transparency

Additional strong research information on health systems

Significant utilization evidence, in a health information technology (HIT) framework, is a procedure, which records that an individual or institution has successfully illustrated significant use and is successfully satisfying the requirements for EMRs and other associated technologies. The stages of meaningful attestation include Information capture and sharing, improved clinical procedures, and better results (Healthit, 2015). One of Stage 1 MU major objectives for Eligible Professionals and Eligible Hospitals is to secure electronic health data developed or sustained by a certified EMR. In order to attest to this objective, your answer should be "Yes." In case one's answer is yes, then they are actually stating that they have carried out a Security Risk Analysis. The HIPPA security rules are just applicable to electronic protected health information. This is in contrary to the Privacy Rule that is applicable to all kinds of protected health data (ASHA, 2015).