Avoiding Adverse Consequences of E-Health (original) (raw)
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Information technology for patient safety
Quality and Safety in Health Care, 2010
Background Research on patient care has identified substantial variations in the quality and safety of healthcare and the considerable risks of iatrogenic harm as significant issues. These failings contribute to the high rates of potentially avoidable morbidity and mortality and to the rising levels of healthcare expenditure seen in many health systems. There have been substantial developments in information technology in recent decades and there is now real potential to apply these technological developments to improve the provision of healthcare universally. Of particular international interest is the use of eHealth applications. There is, however, a large gap between the theoretical and empirically demonstrated benefits of eHealth applications. While these applications typically have the technical capability to help professionals in the delivery of healthcare, inadequate attention to the socio-technical dimensions of their use can result in new avoidable risks to patients. Results and discussion Given the current lack of evidence on quality and safety improvements and on the costebenefits associated with the introduction of eHealth applications, there should be a focus on implementing more mature technologies; it is also important that eHealth applications should be evaluated against a comprehensive and rigorous set of measures, ideally at all stages of their application life cycle.
Current challenges in health information technology–related patient safety
Health Informatics Journal
We identify and describe nine key, short-term, challenges to help healthcare organizations, health information technology developers, researchers, policymakers, and funders focus their efforts on health information technology–related patient safety. Categorized according to the stage of the health information technology lifecycle where they appear, these challenges relate to (1) developing models, methods, and tools to enable risk assessment; (2) developing standard user interface design features and functions; (3) ensuring the safety of software in an interfaced, network-enabled clinical environment; (4) implementing a method for unambiguous patient identification (1–4 Design and Development stage); (5) developing and implementing decision support which improves safety; (6) identifying practices to safely manage information technology system transitions (5 and 6 Implementation and Use stage); (7) developing real-time methods to enable automated surveillance and monitoring of system...
2014
Electronic health (e-health) refers to the delivery of health care with supporting from various data and correspondence technologies, for example, electronic health records, e-medicine, clinical decision help, and computerized provider order entry. E-health is considered by government, providers, and payers as an issue method of enhancing quality, safety, and expenses associated with the delivery of health care. Despite the fact that currently on a pedestal, e-health has not been readily adopted by a dominant part of health care providers. To achieve greater appropriation and use of technology in health care, the health care group needs a guide, or model for reception, that can be used to develop a business case to lower hazard for providers who receive and use technology in clinical practice. The goal of this article is to highlight the key factors to establish e-health system. Also this paper advocates for (1) greater dissemination of implementation best practices, (2) continued development of a solid e-health workforce, and (3) sustainable resources to help those seeking to embrace and use e-health technologies in clinical practice. The e-health group is invited to advance the guide to help providers in embracing and using data and correspondence technologies for health care system improvements.
Electronic Health Records and National Patient-Safety Goals
New England Journal of Medicine, 2012
Electronic health records (EHRs) are essential to improving patient safety. 1 Hospitals and health care providers are implementing EHRs rapidly in response to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. 2-4 The number of certified EHR vendors in the United States has increased from 60 5,6 to more than 1000 7 since mid-2008. Recent evidence has highlighted substantial and often unexpected risks resulting from the use of EHRs and other forms of health information technology. 8-12 These concerns are compounded by the extraordinary pace of EHR development and implementation. Thus, the unique safety risks posed by the use of EHRs should be considered alongside the potential benefits of these systems. At a time when institutions are focused heavily on achieving "meaningful use" requirements, we propose that clearer guidance be provided so that these institutions can align activities related to patient safety with the activities required to support a safe EHRenabled health care system. 13 A set of EHR-specific safety goals, modeled after the Joint Commission's National Patient Safety Goals, may provide organizations with areas of focus for sustained improvements in organizational infrastructure, processes, and culture as they adapt to new technology. EHR implementation is still highly heterogeneous across health care systems and providers, and this heterogeneity leads to equally variable implications for patient safety. For instance, the priorities for patient safety in an organization in the midst of an EHR rollout differ from those of an organization that has used a fully integrated EHR system for 5 or more years. To account for the variation in the stages of implementation and levels of complexity across clinical practice settings, we propose a three-phase framework for the development of EHRspecific patient-safety goals (e-PSGs). The first phase of the framework, aimed at all EHR users but especially at recent and future adopters, includes goals to mitigate risks that are unique and specific to technology 14 (e.g., technology that is unsafe owing to unavailable or malfunctioning hardware or software). The second phase addresses issues created by the failure to use technology appropriately or by misuse of technology. 15 The final phase focuses on the use of technology to monitor health care processes and outcomes and identify potential safety issues before they can harm patients. 16 This framework can lay the foundation for the development of e-PSGs within the context of EHR-enabled health care.
Patient safety and health information technology conceptual framework
Knowledge Management & E-Learning: An International Journal, 2021
Health information technology (HIT) refers to the deployment of electronic systems health care professionals and patients use to store, share, and analyze health information to improve patient safety and outcomes. Some of the best practices to heighten HIT use include procuring and analyzing data, prioritizing interoperability, building dynamic content, accounting for evolving patient expectations, recognizing the human element, and respect for the patient as the health consumer. Providers should target patients with the appropriate HIT information that is tailored to their needs and circumstances. Thus, careful evaluation is required to ensure it meets the needs of the patients. In this paper, we describe the current state of electronic health records use in Canada along with a patient safety and technology conceptual framework. We use this framework and metal hypersensitivity, a medical device-related adverse event, to highlight how health information technology can be leveraged to create a 396 E. Opoku-Agyemang et al. (2021) learning health system and enhance patient safety.
Patient Safety and Health Information Technology: Role of the Electronic Health Record
An electronic health record (EHR) is a real-time, point-of-care, patient-centric information resource for clinicians 1 that represents a major domain of health information technology (HIT). More recently, an EHR has been defined as "a longitudinal electronic record of patient health information, produced by encounters in one or more care settings." 2 It includes patient information such as a problem list, orders, medications, vital signs, past medical history, notes, laboratory results, and radiology reports, among other things. The EHR generates a complete record of a clinical patient encounter or episode of care and underpins care-related activities such as decisionmaking, quality management, and clinical reporting. Some distinguish between the terms EHR and electronic medical record (EMR), with EMR focusing on ambulatory care systems. However, in practice, the terms are interchangeable. In this chapter, the term EHR relates to computerized patient health records stored within and among institutions.
Today's systems and organizations that provide health care meet the complex requirements of providing efficient and cost-effective service, where the quality and safety of medical services must be at the highest level. Taking into account the need to improve the quality of the new generation of health care systems, electronic companies with their solutions in the field of health care want to help health institutions and other entities involved in the health system in improving efficiency, timeliness, safety and overall quality of medical services.