Benefits of EHR: Improved Quality Care & Fast Access to Patient Info - Essay Sample

Introduction

Electronic health records have an impact on increased quality care. Accurate and thorough information which is up to date will result in better diagnoses. The health provider at any time will be able to establish which tests were done previously, what medication was issued, and which worked and which did not work. For instance, during an emergency, a patient's medical information is able to be retrieved faster, and his/EHR medical history established. EHR ensures that patients' information is exchanged in the current time. When prescriptions are written down, there is a chance they might get lost or be misplaced and this can cause the patient to be prescribed the wrong dosage. But with the EHR, there is a direct communication to the pharmacy which reduces errors and saves time by eliminating lost prescriptions. The EHR can check for possibly fatal drug interactions and in this way, a patient's safety is ensured. The most significant focus of any health care provider is to have management of chronic conditions and diseases, an accurate diagnosis and excellent overall patient health care.

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EHR allows specialties, hospitals, pharmacies, and emergency teams to share information helps in strategic decision making especially when critical conditions emerge. Experiencing a medical error can have a tremendous effect on the patient, the doctor and the health care provider. EHR ensures that there are minimized medical errors through better tracking and regular documentation and data errors from transcription. With the EHR of information, the issues of lost and misplaced records file are completely eliminated. In that case, the medical providers will spend more time attending to treatments other than tracking records. Using this technology, the hospitals are able to track patterns which previously could not be established. This results in effective cures.

Digital records significantly reduce administrative costs. For example, eliminating the need to transcribe code and have physical storage. Staff working in hospitals can spend a lot of measurable time in work processing forms and filling them. With digital storage, clinicians are able to reduce routine tasks with decreasing paperwork, storage space decreases too and this will affect positively on the finances of the hospital.

Increased efficiency and productivity through centralized management of charts whereby the patient's information is quickly accessed anywhere with specific query condition. Office management is made smooth by integrating schedules which are linked to progress notes, insurance claims and automated coding. Time is greatly saved.

Some culturally diverse or multi-generation workforce issues towards EHR adoption that may occur. With hospital policies, the workforce is promoted through equality. Hiring should be diverse considering all staff at all levels. All of these staff should receive constant training and education regarding their diversity.

With a difference in way of doing things in different nationalities, patients may be worried about how EHR works. But with communication and language assistance, a patient without enough knowledge will be offered assistance and receive care in due time.

It will improve the satisfaction of employees from all cultures, building teamwork among different cultural employees, therefore bringing in more ideas.

Strategies to mitigate the issues, and implement the adoption of EHR across the workforce within 1 year can be listed as below.

Implementation of the EHR will present some challenges. Unless these challenges are mitigated, serious implications can occur.

Adoption is a challenge that needs to be mitigated. The health facility should inform their staff that the EHR is for delivering higher and quality care in a more efficient way. Most clinicians have a negative attitude toward EHR. To mitigate this, the organization can allow its staff to design EHR workflows and planning how to implement the process. With this strategy, the clinicians will take ownership of the technology by giving them a voice.

Effective training is required during implementation to avoid related challenges. The most challenging thing about training is coming up with training content that will align with the current user's skills and their computer literacy levels. How to mitigate is by familiarizing with the level of computer literacy levels among the staff since it's basic. Whether a staff needs additional training or basic.

Sharing of data with other facilities can be dangerous inefficiency to deliver care despite all the regulations put across. It can reflect poor performance on the side of the organization and cause patients dissatisfaction. To overcome this, EHR should be selected on full interoperability basis. Another way is to look for a way to share data seamlessly with third-party add-ons or any other technology that may be available

References

Goetz, D. G., Kuzel, A. J., Feng, L. B., DeShazo, J. P., & Love, L. E. (2012). EHRs in primary care practices: benefits, challenges, and successful strategies. The American journal of managed care, 18(2), e48-54.

Kruser, K. (2007). The adoption of electronic health records: benefits and challenges. Annals Health L., 16, 317.

Menachemi, N., & Brooks, R. G. (2006). Reviewing the benefits and costs of electronic health records and associated patient safety technologies. Journal of medical systems, 30(3), 159-168.

Zandieh, S. O., Yoon-Flannery, K., Kuperman, G. J., Langsam, D. J., Hyman, D., & Kaushal, R. (2008). Challenges to EHR implementation in electronic-versus paper-based office practices. Journal of general internal medicine, 23(6), 755-761.