Analyze major events and technological advantages that influenced modern Health Care Information Systems.
If we go back to look at the healthcare system of the 1960’s we will see two major payers Medicare and Medicaid. The database systems of these payers were crude and primary at best and that did not make much difference because the payers only accepted payer claims that were handwritten by a secretary. Moving to the 1970’s brings the advent of the large clinical labs and pharmacy. Computers in the 1970’s began in single departments and consecutive departments were added one the viability was proven on each single department. The 1980’s is the time frame in which the supercomputers began to appear in force in the hospital in the laboratory departments and eventually patient accounting. This patient accounting feature then apparently talked to the databases on the payer’s side. The number of payers began to increase from the 2 payer system to a multi payer system. The innovation of the personal computers in addition to mainframes allowed for the addition of the computing power to the desks of secretaries and technicians. The problem that was the personal computers were not transactional and were simply standalone systems. It took until the 1990”s to achieve a communication link to include the desktops and the mainframes. At this point then clinical and financial integrated packages were installed and the hospitals were beginning to use an integrated database as the emerging network solutions.
More conventional computing and competition drive healthcare and the need to integrate the hospitals, providers, and managed care needed. From the IT department the hospitals needed the broad access to computing systems and the robust networks. Also used widely was an IDN integrated data and reporting systems. The 2000’s offered more integration of payer’s software and the payer reimbursements systems ae integrated into the providers systems and the technology of the clinical and laboratory divisions integrate into the medical and diagnostic areas also. Hospitals and provider offices are dependent upon the technology at this point to the areas of provider patient care and payment for the services. The most recent developments in the automation of medical records and the creation of a health information infrastructure through the use of mobile technology is viewed in this context of the last forty years of investment of time and resources by the payers and the institutions. The United States is poised to integrate and grow the healthcare systems at a rate that was only a dream in the past.
Analyze the global business processes used in Health Care Information Technology (HCIT) and their relationship to the organization as a whole.
In the world theater the health information systems are creeping into every country’s health system in some form or other. For instance the higher functioning IT countries such as England, France, Germany are dealing with the mobile EMT records as the main HIT functions are integrated and fully functioning in the countries still developing health care inroads the outlying areas are not as far along in the technology as they would like. Specifically and example of the extent of the Ebola virus outbreak in 2014, called for disinfection technologies . Many innovations are in the way and being tested in the field which can be made available to all areas in the case of emergencies and outbreaks for non-communicable diseases and emergencies. One of the initiatives of the global Universal Health Coverage is the increase the use of medical devices and health technologies that save lives and improve the quality of life. Many, many people suffer unnecessarily because the lack of access is not available to all. In the low or middle countries, as stated, the problem is to the extent that the affordable technologies are not accessible to many and their quality of life is not suitable in this era. The ramifications of sectors with poor health options affect those other areas that do have health care although not to the same degree. For example the Ebola virus invaded middle countries through travel of the citizens to the area. But the healthcare options are more accessible to the middle countries and the antibodies became available at a greater level. The effort to encourage greater interaction of the middle countries with procurement officers to secure the technology developers helps to increase the amount of technology available to the hospitals and providers in the area. . The use of mobile healthcare technology can in this way assists in the lessening of the scourge of these viral spreading across countries
The World Health Organization offered a contest to acquire the leading technology for helping all the countries and received submissions from 36 countries and 127 new technologies. Technology devices, assistive devices, respiratory support apps and devices for infectious diseases were some of the categories of technologies submitted .
Global health education is a potentially influencing tool for promoting health equality and the reduction of health disparities. The global health initiatives are a future for many potential business and medical professionals. Many people are involved in the development of the technology that will help to reduce the illness that people suffer across the globe. Such education has resulted in many innovations for global health technologies one specifically by the BRICS countries of Brazil, India, Russia, China and South Africa. These countries have formed a health care collective of sorts. In a geopolitical bloc format, the collaboration shapes and reforms the health care technologies of the bloc as a whole. After a slow start, the BRIC countries have developed into a successful healthcare technologies bloc and have developed a form of EMT to pursue a common technology that helps the citizens of all the countries. The literature does not list the advances individually but as a whole allows for the inclusion of progress into the study. No specific advances are listed. .
The highly desirable technology allowing for the EHR (electronic health records) is viewed as a tool to improve the quality of care globally. The use of the EHR is a standard in the United States, Netherlands and many other countries. The Health Information Technologies are greatly affected by the increased use of the EHR. Several improvements are noted with the use of the improved health record including efficiencies for the health care professional. This is particularly important for countries having a large rural population making of or trips to the physician’s office not possible on a routine basis. Chronic disease can be entered into the entire HER and physician interaction then controlled by the mobile phones. Many of the rural areas have some access to the mobile phones and so the people can avail for the physician’s time and the physician can manage the patient via the electronic record. This system prevents medical errors by allowing the physician access to the health records and increases the accuracy of the encounter.
The JIT technology is useful in global as well as local healthcare information transfer. The Just in Time technologies are a cost reduction process that allows for the transferring of technology across industry sectors. For example the just in time inventory management system in the clinical areas of the hospital material management systems creates a process that is lower in cost and more effective than traditional order processing used in the past. In addition to JIT the advances in technology for the supply chain include the agile strategies.
Agile strategies are those which the inventories and supply chains are lean and automated to present the least amount of human intervention and the highest use of the technology available in the supply chain member’s network. This supply chain automation affects many departments in the healthcare delivery systems. Along with an organization and technology influences the flexibility in the lean and agile strategies are necessary in a cooperative framework to improve patient information flow and patient services in total. Currently the supply chain members are not fully agile or even lean so this is a problem for the health care providers and many governments are working to provide funds and other problem finding procedures to encourage the lean and agile technologies. In healthcare, more so than in other industries, the increase of expenses and quality are prime considerations. In order to offer improvements to the global patient care issues the systems have to be more agile and lean as the development of the health care information systems globally increase. Patient care has to be of prime importance and many countries realize that supply chain and other inventory management systems offer more immediate and least costly advances in global technology.
In the International arena there is not a consistent interpretation of the performance indicators. The indicators for performance should be a clear and standardized methodology that is applicable to all. Although the United Nations and the World Health Organization are working diligently to produce this outcome, the road to completion is long and windy. Even the metrics used to define the meaningful comparisons and acceptance of health care technology is not standard and the data collections systems vary widely. Some countries are willing to share their data and progress others not so much. The key to a successful global effort is in the process of creating comparable systems indicators and the appropriate methods for sharing this information. This is a complex system and the unreported variations can affect the systematic reporting of the whole system. Some type of policy is needed to allow for greater collaboration in the health care providers globally.
Conclusion
For much of the world a truly productive and functioning electronic health record may or may be operational. For much of the world this may not be the most pressing goal for the healthcare funds as many pressing issues in health care always are present. But now appears to be the time to move toward a global effort the meet the specific needs of each country as regards the health information technology. It is basically the same process for a physician in France to treat a patient as for a physician to treat a patient in India. The process of healthcare can be standardized to use the similar technologies to produce a standard global technology initiative that increase the health and wellbeing of the citizens. The move from paper processing to electronic processing was successful in the United States and other countries. The electronic processing is a more affordable and obtainable investment in the future health of the citizens as well as a future return on the investment of the initial computers and other pieces of technology. EHR is not a data storage system but a truly computerized health administration technology that can increase the amount of time that the physician can spend helping a patient rather than haggling to get incomplete medical records.
Illnesses such as Ebola and Zika virus show how an underdeveloped countries health can affect many countries. In these times of the threat of viruses being used as weapons etc. the quick and accurate transmission of data among nations is an asset to the health of the global population and not an isolated nation or nations. Efforts to increase the use of technology increase the health of nations in many ways and are a needed attribute to a global initiative.
References
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