WRTG101
In this generation, everyone is technological minded. Business, schools are embracing technology so that they can reach their goal. The management of healthcare in the past have been finding it hectic in the overall management of the health care. This is because in the hospital management, there is a lot of paper work and routine that always makes operation to be hard and delays inevitable.
Introduction of technology in the overall running of the hospitals has enabled the healthcare management to fulfill its vision of having a working management system that is interoperable. With the introduction of technology into the daily running of hospital management, has led to healthcare to provide a single interface, that has the ability of providing patient information, interactive session between patients and the medical staffs, time bound, and a system that will aid the medical staffs to make an informed decisions when attending to the patients (Eder, 2000).
One of the most outstanding devices that has revolutionized the healthcare is the advent of Electronic Medical Records famously known as EMR. This device has the capability of storing the patient’s information electronically. Because of the format of the data, it is so easy to retrieve it after an examination. This is because the format of the data is digital. This has eased data storage and retrieval. Most of the data that was being stored in the health care before the advent of this device was hard to integrated when the patient wanted to receive medical attention. This is because the data obviously was combined from different department before being stored in cabinets (Advantageemr.com, 2013).
The EMR has solved the problem of integrating data from different department, different staffs, and disparate healthcare’s. The data is updated and can be viewed across different department, facilities, and other medical facilities that have specific interest with the patient (Eder, 2000).
Medical information that concerns a patient is prompt when queried. Using this device, the medical practitioner can have the patient medical history instantly as requested and update the information immediately. Unlike the older time when the medical information of a patient was to be filed and retrieved following filed manually which wasted time.
Information sharing is common in medical practice and it has been used over time to check and monitor health conditions and in case of an epidemic to raise an alarm on time. Physical transfer of records is a tedious time consuming and a less effective means of sharing medical information. EMR has provided an easy platform for sharing of medical records between hospitals. The messaging standards that ensure interoperability due to technical standards set has greatly aided the transfer of data between different hospitals in almost real-time (Advantageemr.com, 2013).
The systematic computerized data entry has saved on time and it has helped in the standards of documentation of the patients records. This also has aided in the manner by which data is interrogated. The staff get easy standard way in interpretation of the medical records and it helps the hospital management in formation of the clinical programs and other important healthcare policy decisions.
Sharing of healthcare reports has also increased the transfer of best practices in the sector among the health practitioners. The sharing of information has also led to the development of standardized clinical processes and procedures that are based on best working practices in different health facilities and such processes are set as standards. Because of data sharing among the staffs, the device has helped in minimizing of errors (Advantageemr.com, 2013).
The speed of serving patients has tremendously increases due to coordinated processes in the healthcare institutions. The linking of different health procedures is greatly enhance due to the ease of communication between the staff (Micromd, 2013).The EMR has also set a basis whereby the performance of health facilities can be analyzed. This information can be used in improving the general efficiency of the healthcare.
The patients safety is also improved when they go to the hospitals because like an EMR offers support to the decisions which are made by the healthcare professionals provide. This is like when the systems provide alerts of different prevalent allergies or epidemics and diseases at in a certain geographical area at the time. This hence equips the medical practitioner with the up-to-date prevalent information that is required for them to make the best clinical decision and also it reduces the diagnosis time for the patients. The practitioner is also able to get the latest best prescription available for certain condition. The EMR system hence limits human error the would have been caused by ignorance of the practitioner hence assuring a patient quality healthcare(Micromd, 2013).
The technological advancements has reduced the cost of data accessibility at the point hence reducing the general cost of healthcare provision. Data duplication has been dealt with because of introduction of this device into the healthcare operation. By this, the healthcare has increased efficiency.
The impact of technology cannot be exhausted. Every day new discoveries by use of technology is revolutionizing the daily operation of the healthcare in the world. The baseline is technology has come to improve the operating standards of the healthcare.
Technological breakthroughs have revolutionized the delivery of health care. This is because technology has as well changed the organization and structure of the entire medical field. This is characterized by the changes and advances in bio-medical engineering, which is changing at6 an ever increasing rate. Without any doubts, the influence of technology is indispensable to the health of the people and has also improved the people’s life quality. Health technology has as well contributed heavily to the economy as it contributes billions of dollars every year.Innovation of technology has opened the door to more and non-invasive procedures. This is because diagnostics have become easier and more accurate due to the advancements in areas like nuclear medicine (Westbrook, 2007). In the present days, numerous imaging methods allow physicians and technicians to examine the anatomy of a patient without the need for invasive procedures during diagnosis.Invasive surgeries within the thoracic and cardiovascular disciplines have become very common in the recent years. The development that has brought about better instruments and more advanced use of technology has enabled surgeons to perform some of the procedures in very minimally invasive ways. This was not possible some few years ago.Internet has also brought a lot of knowledge in the health care sector. This is because it has been a great resource for living a life that is healthy through following the advice that is present in some of the websites. This information has enabled people to reduce the time they spend visiting physicians as well as the amount of money that is used with physician appointments. Thus, the internet has enabled self diagnosis although, at some point, it becomes a dangerous way to deal with some of the illness.Research through technology has also provided many discoveries of new treatments that are being used in the health care facilities (Geisler, 2003). This has helped in improving the health outcomes to patients who in turn, help reduce the burden in the system of health care. Some other benefits of using technology in the health care systems include early detection of diseases in the human body, less side effects on individuals lives brought about by treatment, there is early treatment of diseases before they reach the critical stages where they are untreatable or points where the treatment is very expensive, there is improved service functionality, for example, there is less follow up needed after the treatment of a patient and also there is the treatment of many patients as compared to the past when the system was slow and not convenient.There are also some disadvantages that technology has brought to the healthcare sector. Some of these challenges include high cost of treatment. This is because new technology treatments are very costly to research as well as to develop. The technology also requires many trained personnel who can be able to apply the technology. It is also time consuming because the technology and techniques have to be done with high assurance that it is safe and has very minimal side effects if any. This quality assurance takes a lot of time so as to ensure that safe effects and procedures occur to individuals (Toko, 2004). Technology has also brought the issue of equity access in the health sectors. This is because people with money receive better services than those without money. This is because the services that are offered in the sector have become expensive due to the technology involved.
References
Advantageemr.com (2013). Advantage EMR. [online] Retrieved from: http://www.advantageemr.com/ [Accessed: 29 Nov 2013].
Eder, L. (2000). Managing healthcare information systems with Web-enabled technologies. Hershey, Pa.: Idea Group Pub..
Micromd (2013). Advantages of EMR - Electronic Medical Records | MicroMD. [online] Retrieved from: http://www.micromd.com/emr/advantages.html [Accessed: 29 Nov 2013].
Geisler, Eliezer, Koos Krabbendam, and Roel Schuring.(2003) Technology, health care, and management in the hospital of the future. Westport, CT: Praeger,
Tako, Yasuhiro.(2004) Closed habitation experiments and material circulation technology: proceedings of the International Symposium on Closed Habitation Experiments and Material Circulation Technology. Rokkasho-mura(Aomori-ken): Institute for Environmental Sciences,
Westbrook, Johanna.( 2007) Information technology in health care 2007 proceedings of the 3rd international conference on information technology in health care : socio-technical approaches. Amsterdam: IOS Press,
