by Brett Kinsler | Sep 14, 2015 | Electronic Health Records, Population Health
Most hospitals and health systems in the US have instituted EHRs across their enterprises for health data management. However, the realization of value from that significant investment is sometimes lacking. This is often due to improper or incomplete installation, failure to leverage features or an organization that has not otherwise prioritized initiatives to extract value from their EHRs.
CIOs in healthcare are now seeking and forming programs to increase the benefits their hospitals and health systems can gain from electronic health record systems. According to a recent survey of the 1,400+ members of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME), the HIT industry should expect an increased focus on the optimization of EHRs. More than 70% of responding CHIME members stated that this coming year’s top IT priorities for their organization will be projects that harness value from their EHRs. And of these respondents, almost three quarters plan to utilize outside firms to assist their internal teams with these projects.
This is a forward-thinking and positive trend which should have tangible benefits on an organization’s bottom line as well as yielding outcomes-based improvement for stated initiatives. More data is of no benefit without using that information in a positive way. Programs like the Unity Health System’s Community Diabetes Collaborative (CDC), which helped Rochester-area patients with diabetes improve their blood glucose levels by 14 percent in the first 18 months, take what could have been background noise and transform it into population health initiatives that improve care quality and save money.
by Brett Kinsler | Sep 13, 2015 | Interoperability
The disconnect in U.S. health care results in higher costs and less favorable outcomes for patients. In the United States, personal health information is largely held within hospitals, physician practices and pharmacies, and typically cannot be shared routinely outside those individual settings. Organizations that permit secure sharing of pertinent information, like Health Information Exchanges (HIEs) and Regional Health Information Organizations (RHIOs) are an effective method to ameliorate the situation.
Transfers of care from one provider to another are a common pitfall for gaps in care. When patients move from within and across health care systems, delayed patient care and reduced quality and efficiency of health care occurs without also the proper transfer of information. The exchange of health care data improves provider communication, provides for better coordination of care and transfers, increases patient engagement and lowers overall costs of care. Coordinated efforts of treatment and procedure documentation also provide a higher level of patient safety by decreasing unnecessary duplication of services, such as repeated imaging.
At the present time, there is no universal grid that permits all providers to plug and play their information. Due to security concerns and the difficulty of establishing interoperability standards, health systems that utilize differing EHRs often need assistance making sense of the data, workflows and establishing peer relationships of data. The health care technology industry, in concert with vendors, providers, payors and regulatory agencies, need to embrace present and future efforts to establish universal standards — the safety of our patients is depending on it.
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