Identifying External Influences
What external influences can you identify that impact HIT?
One of the external influences that impact HIT is interdependence of information exchange between healthcare organizations. In other for HIT to achieve its full potential, healthcare organization have to be willing to share healthcare records such as patient history, labs, medications, and many more. Kruse, DeShazo, Kim, and Fulton (2014) asserts that, “the lack of absolute independence requires some degree of interorganizational exchange of goods or services. As organizations build and negotiate relationships with each other in the exchange of resources, positions of power are established. No one organization can provide all of its own resources, so each organization becomes dependent on the other organizations that control the resources”. However, most organizations are reluctant in sharing healthcare information with external organizations that does not belong to their group. “Reaping the benefits of HIE is dependent upon the collaboration and harmonization of efforts between a network of stakeholders such as physicians, hospitals, patients, government entities, EHR vendors, and policymakers” (Cannoy, & Carter, 2011). Some organizations are reluctant in exchanging health information due to security to comply with HIPPA, and protection of organization identity for competition. “One of the many motivations that hospitals may have to silo their patients’ records is to avoid competitors benefiting from the opinions of highly paid clinical or technical staff” (Miller, & Tucker, 2014).
References
Cannoy, S. D., & Carter, P. E. (2011). Information Politics in Health Information Exchange Networks. Journal Of Information Privacy & Security, 7(2), 65-90.
Kruse, C. S., DeShazo, J., Kim, F., & Fulton, L. (2014). Factors associated with adoption of health information technology: A conceptual model based on a systematic review. JMIR Medical Informatics, 2(1), e9. http://doi.org/10.2196/medinform.3106
Miller, A. R., & Tucker, C. (2014). Health information exchange, system size and information silos. Journal Of Health Economics, 3328-42. doi:10.1016/j.jhealeco.2013.10.004
The most apparent external influence that can affect the health information technology is humans. Humans are guaranteed to be flawed and that means that errors will be made. “Over the past few years the health care industry has begun introducing health information technology (health IT) and electronic health records (EHRs) to help reduce the potential for human errors”(Heller, 2015). Since humans make errors and the health information technology is used by humans its only logical that the technology will be affected by this. Healthcare providers can fail to calculate the proper medication dosage, fail to read a patients chart before prescribing them medication, and encounter missing information that is that is essential for proper treatment on a chart (Heller, 2015). These are all things that will make the health information technology ineffective due to errors made by the humans using them. “The aim of health IT is to reduce doctor errors and become more efficient, it still relies on humans to use and maintain it and as we all know humans make errors”(Heller, 2015). In a survey human error was the top of the list of contributing to factors on what is affecting health information technology. Other external factors are vendor issues, training, and internal organizational policies and procedures. Heath information technology is important for health providers to adopt but they will have to focus reducing the chance of human errors affecting how well and efficient the system can be.
References:
Heller, C. (2015) Health information technology is not immune to human error. Retrieved from: https://www.chhlaw.com/health-information-technology-not-immune-human-error-2/
Healthcare Information Technology is changing the future of healthcare. HIT can increase quality, efficiency, and access to healthcare, while reducing costs. Increasing pressure and incentives are causing increasing numbers of organizations to implement HIT systems. As with any major workflow change, there are challenges. There are three major categories that influence the successful implementation of HIT systems.
The first category is technical. The technology has to be user friendly. The system should also be compatible with other information-based systems in order to share information with ease. Also the information system should support regulatory, accreditation, and legislative reporting requirements (“Factors Influencing Successful,” 2011). The second category is sociological. The organization has to be ready for the transition. The people implementing the changes should have the technical skills to install the system. The organization has to ensure that the users of the system are trained properly. The third category is organizational. The organization needs to have skilled workers that understand the workflow of the organization and possible deficiencies of HIT. These workers should be able to help in the selection of information systems; integrate the new system with existing systems and databases; train peers on using the systems; identify system limitations; and help design next generation systems (“Factors Influencing Successful,” 2011).
Reference:
Factors Influencing Successful Health Information Technology (HIT) Implementation. (2011, April).
Retrieved from https://www.amia.org/sites/default/files/files_2/Factors-Influencing-Successful-HIT-Implementation-fact-sheet-04-08-11.pdf