Medical technology is fast changing the healthcare setting along with the varying practice patterns of physicians. Integrating technology in healthcare is crucial for the health of individuals and optimal life quality in several regions. A majority of research suggest that the current medicine practices are integrally reliant on technology. The occurrence is possibly centered on the interpretations that the healthcare practitioners utilize a broad scope of technology in the diagnosis, treatment and assessment of their patients’ care. The current technology in healthcare is highly innovative, highly efficient, and in most situations, very expensive (Evans, 2010). Additionally, there are the continuous intensifying demands for the therapeutic health care facilities, high technology diagnostic and their obtainability might clash with the medical requirements, cost efficiency, and social justice. Recent research establishes that the implementation of technology in healthcare could result in increased effectiveness, optimal quality healthcare accessibility, and the safety of the patients (Mostashari, 2014). As a result, the topic on technology in healthcare is selected to establish its role in enhancing health outcomes, minimizing the mistakes in medicine, enhance the management of the chronic diseases, minimize the disparities of health, and provide considerable cost savings.
The quick rise of new technology is being utilized in healthcare and the majority of applications of medicine. The trend provides the favorable suitable cure, processes utilized for diagnostics and medications. The relevance of technology in healthcare has inspired its duty upwards, intensifying the requests for availability of the medical choices and the degree of treatment offers and medical programs. One example of its relevance in healthcare is observed in the hospital setting by diagnosing every type of disease that man has been affected with for an extensive period. Different from when it was created; contaminations and several types of illnesses could presently be regulated and identified before with the profusion of new technologies. The relevance of technology is that it assists in providing timely treatment to patients (Mostashari, 2014). Furthermore, it strengthens the precision percentile of the process of operation and surgery. With the advanced machines and tools utilized; such processes are presently detailed and reliable.
In addition, hospitals could utilize the technology to endorse the current, deep concerned focusing on all programs that involve patient health care. Technology in healthcare mounts the digital network systems for monitoring every restriction of the body and heart rate, could store the information details that assist the treatment of the patients. Contemporary technology is efficient in combatting the ancient plagues: the spreading of virus and infection. In addition, several medical institutions are presently beginning to introduce the robotic system that completes tasks and duties that range from delivering medical supply to be utilized in operations and surgeries. The significance of technology in healthcare puts the robotics as the substitute to the security employees that put all corners of the buildings to establish safer settings, highly substantial and less costly.
The healthcare institution becomes more competent with the inclusion of technology. In addition, the use of the new technology increases the esteem of the medical practitioners and ability to function effectively. With the manifestation of innovation, hospitals are presently experiencing the huge test of information technology and pioneering equipment daring the conventional medical procedures (Faulkner, 2009). The technology adapts and changes the time-worn equipment to the contemporary, high technological devices.
New technology in healthcare is becoming a more multi-purpose process. The trend is implemented in diverse applications with newer available methods. The medical practitioners and physicians have often favored having innovative applications in their devices used for work so as to operate professionally and accurately. From time, technology has been an associate of man as development emerged. The relevance in hospitals offers the new development in the medical industry.
In America, despite having advanced technology in healthcare, it is often very costly. In 2010, the costs of healthcare were approximately $2 trillion dollars (Anderson, 2011). For years, the level of money that is spent on the health care has intensified more compared to the growth of the general economy (Bost, 2016). For instance, the spending on health care was just about 5% of the GDP gross during the 1960s; however, it intensified to about 17% in 2010 (Anderson, 2011). In America, the GDP percentage that was spent on health care was considerably greater compared to that of other nations. Due to its expense, the government is usually reluctant to provide funds for enhancing technology in healthcare.
As a result, recognizing and accessing funds is basically a problem of staying well-informed of the future chances of acquiring funds from the government by performing consistent research on the internet regarding the opportunities of funding and being connected with the key partners in learning about the opportunities for acquiring funds. As such, one could lobby for support through utilizing several useful resources for being abreast on the chances for acquiring funds (Bauer, 2016). The Grantsmanship is one of the resources that deliver state-specific data regarding the best foundations for grants and the corporate giving program, in addition to the links to the homepages of the state governments.
The use of the Foundation Center can be of use as it is the main source of philanthropy globally and is backed by over 500 foundations. In addition, the Grants.gov resource comprises of the grant chances from more than 20 federal grant making institutions, which include the departments of Education, Agriculture, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, and Transportation, in addition to the healthcare department (Bauer, 2016). Another way of lobbying is through advertising to influence the opinions of the public on the government. The advertisements must be strategically placed to be seen by the decision-makers in Washington.
As stated earlier, foundations could be a huge source of assisting in the funding of any project, and establishing the correct foundation for the projects is a crucial preliminary step in the process of implementation. There are several types of foundations which include public foundations, family, and community. A number of them are small and often serve specific communities, while there are others that might provide hundreds of dollars for funding the project throughout the nation. It is recommended to utilize numerous websites that could assist one in presenting their case to enable them to acquire funds for implementing technology in healthcare (Bauer, 2016). In addition, other resources like the United Way, local chamber of commerce, and the Government county council are optimal resources for lobbying to acquire funds for the implementation of technology in healthcare.
The successful integration of technology in healthcare commences before the technology arrives. When assessing the application of the electronic health records, suitable leadership and shared visions are often the factors that result in successful integration (Ball, 2012). The successful integration involves employing a project manager who is able to ease the hospital team in the transition of introduction of new technology. The clinicians start numerous techniques of ensuring integration of the clinical workflow into healthcare technology during its application. With the utilization of methods like workflow evaluations and the workflow diagram, physicians could create suitable processes to guarantee that the integration of technology in healthcare will lead to reduced disruptions to productivity. Exploiting the workflow evaluations in the pre-implementation stage, the physicians could attain an optimal recognition of the numerous patterns used for creating the predictable workflow in the healthcare environment. Research by Ball (2012) identified that the inclusion of an expert within the institution to involve and educate the hospital staff on the extensive benefits of the technological system to the routine workflows is a crucial feature of successful integration. The central role of the technological expert is promoting the advantages of implementing technology in the healthcare environment, which entail the enhancement to workflow effectiveness, improvement of the safety of patients, and enhancements to delivering care. The implementation of new available technologies into the healthcare system usually is a responsibility of the healthcare manager, and systematic training is needed for every staff member. The forms of technology to be implemented could be costly, and the effort or money spent on obtaining the tools could be wasteful if the healthcare provider lacks suitable understanding of their value or use. Technology functions to enhance the healthcare field, but with no complete comprehension of the integration of the technologies in the system of healthcare, the value of such improvements is reduced.
Technology has profusely penetrated all stages of the social order. It dominates from the small gadgets that individuals are utilizing daily to the complex huge apparatuses that rule the various industries such as the healthcare and manufacturing industry. As technology develops and changes, it is presently strongly swaying the medical institutions that are mainly concerned with everyone’s health and well-being. Regardless of the increased expenses and the medical technology’s complexity, the utilization of the new technology is still spreading. The advantages of the medical enhancements overshadow their disadvantages. The costly technology is simple a bargain if it could enhance the quality of patients, maintain economic productivities and avoid the increased disability costs.
References
Anderson, J. G. (2011). Benefits and Barriers to Adoption of Information Technology in US Healthcare. Handbook of Research on Information Technology Management and Clinical Data Administration in Healthcare. doi:10.4018/9781605663562.ch014
Ball, M. J., & Douglas, J. V. (2012). Integrating Information Technology in Healthcare. Dental Informatics, 305-309. doi:10.1007/978-1-4613-9160-9_17
Bauer, T. (2016). Literature on CSR, Lobbying and Responsible Lobbying. Responsible Lobbying, 7-68. doi:10.1007/978-3-658-15539-1_2
Bost, P. (2016). Rising Healthcare Spending: Is Technology the Solution? Healthcare Engineering, 29-36. doi:10.1007/978-981-10-3111-3_5
Evans, N. (2010). Integrating Healthcare with Information and Communications TechnologyIntegrating Healthcare with Information and Communications Technology. Nursing Standard, 24(21), 30-30. doi:10.7748/ns2010.01.24.21.30.b1009
Faulkner, A. (2009). Devising Healthcare and Society. Medical Technology into Healthcare and Society, 188-209. doi:10.1057/9780230228368_9
Mostashari, F. (2014). Health information technology and Healthcare. Healthcare, 2(1), 1-2. doi:10.1016/j.hjdsi.2013.12.008
