Introduction
One of the healthcare tragedies in the contemporary world is the complexity of treatment and management, which involves multiple practitioners who may not even know each other. The implication is that there is little, if any, coordination. Moreover, patients have been cultured to remain passive throughout the treatment period such that when there is an error like an overdose due to a prescription of the same drug by several doctors, they do not question. A possible initiative for combating such problems is taking advantage of electronic medical records (EMR) to streamline the care system and facilitate teamwork and coordination.
Existing Initiatives
The initiative that was put in place to address the challenge is adopting EMR and medical applications on hand devices such as smartphones containing the patient’s data. Traditionally, book reports and medical files where the doctors and nurses can write down any care they have provided. The fact that the healthcare workers caring for one patient may be in different geographical locations presents a problem. The EMR is a digital chart containing patient information that is stored in a computer (“EHR”, 2021). One of the areas of focus for the Institute for Care Improvement is developing learning networks to improve healthcare outcomes (“Why should, 2022). The adoption of digital technologies can help fulfill this objective and improve overall care.
Goals in Addressing the Gap
The first goal is to streamline care within a single system where all the medics working on a single patient can coordinate the care paradigm. For example, if a person has diabetes and has a nutritionist, physiotherapist, nurse, and doctor, they will communicate and update each other on any progress made (Kilbourne et al., 2018). The other goal is to minimize the chances of medical errors because it will be easy to take note of inconsistency. In addition, the electronic medical records will have workflows embedded in the patient portals to trigger the care team to apply best practices (Pappas, 2021). The other goal is the automation of the workflow, which leads to on-time delivery of care. For instance, when it is time for an insulin injection, and the patient has skipped, the nurse gets an alarm and calls the patient to check if there is a problem.
Circumstances Surrounding the Initiative Development
The use of paperwork for records was becoming bulky and taking up more space than is necessary for the hospital. Further, there were several digital inventions that provided the potential of storing data on the cloud without the possibility of exceeding the space. The invention of the internet of things which connects different devices was also a breakthrough in the adoption of the initiative. The adoption of EMR promised to solve the problem of bulkiness and difficulty in data retrieval while providing other benefits, such as remote care coordination. Noteworthy, the EMR system holds health information and data, manages results, enhances order entry and is used for decision support (“EHR”, 2021). The other factor that was considered is the long term cost. Upon investment in the technology, the cost of maintenance is affordable to both the hospital and the clients.
Resources
The adoption of EMR requires human, financial, and hard resources. Particularly, there should be a medical information technologist (IT) with skills and expertise in electronic medical records and computer applications. Money is another relevant resource that was necessary for the implementation of the strategy. Particularly, there will be the initial purchase of the server and the mobile device, and software. In addition, the IT expert and other employees’ salary was relevant in making the initiative successful. The managers have to budget for the finances to maintain their system, install anti-viruses and malware. Moreover, money for training was to get the workers acquitted with the new system.
Reasons for Failure of the System
The main reason why the EMR system failed is because there was no standardization of medical language and the application. The result was that the system failed because every hospital had a different application which brought confusion. In addition, the issue of patient privacy and security of data faults the initiative. When patient data is accessed by an unauthorized person, they can easily cause harm to the patient. The use of mobile devices, which can easily be stolen or hacked, means that cybercriminals can compromise even the records of the hospital.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the use of EMR to bridge the gap of uncoordinated care among the hospital workers was a good initiative. The medical practitioners working on a patient could coordinate care remotely. The challenge is that following the implementation, there are several drawbacks that patients and doctors are realizing including data breach.
References
EHR (electronic health record) vs. EMR (electronic medical record). (2021). Practice Fusion. Web.
Kilbourne, A. M., Hynes, D., O’Toole, T., & Atkins, D. (2018). A research agenda for care coordination for chronic conditions: Aligning implementation, technology, and policy strategies. Translational Behavioral Medicine, 8(3), 515-521. Web.
Pappas, A. (2021). Technology and care coordination | Elation health EHR. Clinical First Electronic Health Record | Elation Health. Web.
Why should leaders support building improvement capabilities? (2022). IHI – Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Web.