IM/IT Analysis
Question one
Patient Care Applications
Features
The introduction of information technology led to improvements in patient-centered care applications. Patient Care Applications are IT tools used by healthcare organizations that enhance and supplement communication between patients and healthcare providers. The main features include patient information recording (admission/discharge/transfer), report generation, and communication equipment, patient care plans, scheduling, and nurse staffing processes. Patient care applications have many capabilities in a healthcare setting.
Capabilities
The main capability of patient care application includes the support of the delivery of quality care to patients by making available their medical records to healthcare providers in an effective and accurate manner. Additionally, they offer patient education and self-monitoring tools. The technology allows healthcare organizations improve patient outcome; hence, transforming the healthcare sector (Powell-Cope, Nelson, and Patterson, 2008).
Operational Benefits
The main benefits of the application include supporting standard care plans, protocols, and guidelines that help minimize medical errors, which the key barrier to the positive patient outcome.
Example: Computer-based learning application, patient-centered care mobile applications, and recombinant-DNA technology app.
Management and enterprise systems
Main features
Health management and enterprise systems are responsible for these operations. They consist of security mechanisms, patient and staff check-in/check-out controls, auditing features, workflow controls, contents, records and document management features.
Capabilities
According to Institute for Health Technology Transformation (2013), health management and enterprise systems have the power to the collection, storage, tracking, reporting, and secure maintenance of clinical data. Advancements in technologies and innovations make it possible for enterprise management systems to store large volumes of data and information in for ages provided the organization use effective operational practices to secure the information from damage and loss.
Operational benefits
U.S. healthcare reforms have become a reality based on its impact in transforming businesses that make it possible for health organizations to operate in the diverse environment. Management and enterprise systems in healthcare have worked towards promoting reforms by streamlining access to health information, eliminating barriers that influence effective operations of health management and information services, and improve the security of patient information. Additionally, it reduces bulkiness in hospitals by encouraging e-recording as opposed to physical files.
Examples include Enterprise Resource Planning in Healthcare, CIO-SP3, MEDHOST Enterprise, and e-Hospital Systems.
E-health applications
Main features
E-health applications are complex and consist of different applications. They assist in implementing health information technologies in healthcare. Features of e-health application include telehealth, mHealth, eLearning, telemedicine, and electronic medical records.
Capabilities
E-health applications play a critical role in influencing the patient outcome by allowing health providers make informed decisions that are paramount to patient safety. They also improve efficiency in the delivery of care by making resources available to health care providers and prevent health risks.
Operational benefits
E-health applications are beneficial in improving patient care. They make it possible for the society to have uninterrupted access to healthcare by facilitating the use and exchange of appropriate data in an effective and efficient manner (Clay, 2012).
Examples: The self-directed online therapy and EPIC EMR
Strategic decision-support applications
Features
The introduction of IT automation made the healthcare industry to undergo rapid growth regarding health delivery. The strategic decision-making application allows the nurse to solve major dilemmas and issues affecting the quality delivery of care. The application consists of features that support and facilitated different activities that influence the outcome of clinical decisions. Its design features consider the need of stakeholders and the type of decisions they make about a specific health issue.
Capabilities
The application promotes interaction among health care providers, stakeholders, and decision-makers. They collect data from stakeholders needed to support a decision-making process.
Operational benefits
Strategic decision-making applications help nurses and practitioners in making accurate decisions on specific clinical problems. Additionally, they improve the safety, quality, and efficiency of the healthcare and patient care (Rajakshmi, Mohan, and Babu, 2011).
Examples: Archimedes IndiGO, DiagnosisOne, and DXplain
Question two
Strategic plan for organization’s IM/IT
Information management (IM) and information technology (IT) creates significant changes in an organization and stakeholders responsible for developing these functions should have enough skills and knowledge about different components that make up an effective plan. Good management plays a vital role in promoting an effective healthcare system. The team requires developing a strategic plan for IM/IT implementation in the healthcare organization. The plan should contain six major elements for it to achieve its expected goal in the healthcare organization (World Health Organization, n.d).
Element #1: Health information systems resources
The strategic plan should follow acceptable regulatory, legislative, and planning guidelines that make up a fully functioning IM/IT system in healthcare. Additionally, functional resources such as logistics support, finance, and personnel must be available to ensure effective coordination and implementation of the system. For example, personnel provides the needed skills and labor required to develop the system while the financial department offers the necessary financial support to implement the program.
Element #2: System indicators
The strategic plan must have goals, objectives, and vision. The indicators assist in determining the function of the system, system inputs, outputs, and expected outcomes after the completion of the plan.
Element #3: Data sources
The IM/IT strategic plan should consider the data source for the system. Collecting relevant data for the IM/IT system requires a systematic approach. The planning team should create an effective method of collecting patient’s data and feeding it to the system.
Element # 4: Data management
The element brings together different aspects of data handling starting from collecting, storing, securing, processing, and analyzing.
Element #5: Information products
The strategic plan should develop processes for transforming patient’s data into information for easier analysis by the nurse or physician. The information presented in the output of the IM/IT system provides the evidence and knowledge needed by the healthcare provider when diagnosing the patient.
Element #6: Disseminating and using the system
The health IM/IT system’s strategic plan must be made available for all associated parties to use. The plan should ensure the system is readily accessible to provide necessary health support and promote delivery of care at all times.
Question three
The importance of a systems development lifecycle
Many health organizations have experienced significant failures in their health IT systems linked to poor strategic planning and implementation. IT failure acts as the primary barrier to the adoption of HIT and HIM in the healthcare sector. Many IT systems that fail do not follow the system development life cycle (SDLC), which acts as an essential element in identifying, designing, and evaluating the system (McMurtrey, 2013). Applying SDLC assists the IT system development team to establish a strategic plan that ensures accomplishment of healthcare objectives and goals. Moreover, SDLC articulates and addresses different areas of the systems making it easier to develop and implement it. SDLC makes the IT system planners understand the purpose and system interactions that help them incorporate all tasks and ensure an effective outcome.
For example, when developing a custom application, the SDLC plays a critical role in planning different stages of the application development and assists developers create user-friendly elements for easier understanding.
Question four
A recommendation of key elements that ensure secure access to health care and patient information within a health care management electronic system
Healthcare management electronic records are vulnerable to unauthorized use and disclosure to other users. Healthcare organizations should institute measures that ensure the safety of healthcare and patient information.
One of the primary elements that the healthcare organization should use in ensuring secure access healthcare and patient information is the administrative safeguards. The recommendation requires the administration to develop policies and procedures within the healthcare organization aimed at protecting the privacy, confidentiality, and security of health and patients’ health electronic records. The organization should follow the HIPAA Privacy and Security rules in establishing these policies and procedures. The main operational capabilities of the element include identifying useful information systems, conducting risk assessments, and developing rules governing the use of electronic health records. For example, the risk analysis component plays a role in conducting an accurate assessment of potential risks that interfere with the privacy and confidentiality of the electronic protected health information (HIPAA, 2007).
The second recommendation involves the implementation of physical safeguards. Physical safeguarding process ensures the protection of the hardware containing health care and electronic patient records from theft or physical harm. The recommendation requires the healthcare administration to facilitate access to the database controls by limiting physical access from unauthorized people. Additionally, it involves the establishment of an appropriate use of the workstation and promoting moral and ethical behavior among the staff.
Question five
Recommendation for improving the application of systems theory to healthcare IM/IT governance and planning
Recommendation #1
Many healthcare leaders lack knowledge of the systems theory that influences the application and implementation of necessary changes and reforms in the healthcare sector. Organizational leaders should undertake training on how to apply systems theory to practice and promote effective application of health information technologies in the delivery of care. The training program equips leaders with system analysis skills, which are essential in designing and developing HIT systems. For example, the systems theory helps in improving the administrative qualities of healthcare leaders by improving their performances that eventually influences patient safety and quality of care.
Recommendation #2
The healthcare sector should ensure all implemented health information systems meet specific standards. The systems theory provides an effective concept analysis procedure that considers the system inputs, processes, outputs, and the feedback that define the IM/IT system requirements. Effective organizational governance ensures proper implementation of standards that promote the application of these concepts. For example, the HIPAA provides standards that ensure IM/IT systems achieve their goals and objectives.
References
Clay, R. A. (2012, May). The advantages of electronic health records. American Psychology
Association. 43(5), 72.
HIPAA. (2007). Security Standards: Administrative Safeguards. HIPAA Security Series, 2(2), 1-
29.
enterprise content management (ECM). Institute for Health Technology Transformation. Retrieved 14 May 2016 from http://ihealthtran.com/wordpress/2013/04/benefits-of-health-care-enterprise-content-management-ecm/
McMurtrey, M. (2013). A Case Study of the Application of the Systems Development Life Cycle
(SDLC) in 21st Century Health Care: Something Old, Something New? Managing Systems and Technology, 1(1), 14-25.
Powell-Cope, G., Nelson, A.L., and Patterson, E.S. (2008). Patient care technology and safety in
Patient Safety and Quality: An Evidence-Based Handbook for Nurses. Rockville (MD): Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (US).
Rajalajshmi, K., Mohan, C. S., Babu, D. (2011, July). Decision support system in the healthcare
industry. International Journal of Computer Applications, 26(9), 42-44.
World Health Organization. (n.d). Components of a strong health information system. A Guide
