Tag Archives: clinician workflow

Unifying the Healthcare Assembly Line

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assembly line 1Driving toward value-based care first requires a healthy understanding of the environment in which we are operating. Though regularly criticized, the U.S. healthcare system is actually strong: we have some of the world’s best hospitals and doctors. Individual service lines can provide attentive and effective care, whether it is cardiology, endocrinology or oncology.

However, we are falling short by failing to pull these service lines together. That is where the challenge lies. By focusing on wellness, we have the capability to deliver collaborative care and truly transformative outcomes.

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Connecting to Patients and Each Other through Technology

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Fadul BlogAs an anesthesiologist, my goal is to make the hospital a better, more efficient place to work so that I may provide the best possible care to my patients from the moment they come under my supervision. As part of this, improving a patient’s health record – and our access to it – by using effective mobile technology is an important step to providing holistic care. With nearly half of a physician’s day devoted to administrative tasks, it feels as though the time we clinicians can spend with our patients is getting slimmer and slimmer. Consequently, we want the precious time we have with our patients to be valuable and ensure them that their concerns are being heard and addressed in an efficient manner.

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Back to Basics: Re-Thinking Mobility & Workflow Efficiencies Within the Hospital

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Nurse Blog 2Care delivery best practices are constantly changing to optimize efficiency and safety, and look considerably different compared to just a decade ago. The digital healthcare transformation has ushered in promising opportunities to use technology to improve nurse and clinician workflows, monitor patients remotely, and provide secure paths for communication between care team members.

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Making Sense of The Joint Commission’s Change of Heart on Secure Texting

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secure textingIn May, The Joint Commission announced that it was changing its five-year-old ban on texting, stating that effective immediately health care organizations may now allow orders to be transmitted via text message.

The topic of ‘secure messaging’ has long been a polarizing topic within the health care industry. Some industry veterans are against it – they question whether this method of communication truly can be secure. Others believe that allowing physicians to issue orders via text messaging is just a matter of time, as there are great tools now available that are HIPAA compliant and provide the security and audit trail needed to make this workflow improvement. I am in the latter group.

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Making Technology Work for Nurses

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nurse-technologyNursing is the protection, promotion, and optimization of health and abilities, prevention of illness and injury, alleviation of suffering through the diagnosis and treatment of human response, and advocacy in the care of individuals, families, communities, and populations (American Nurses Association, 2014)

Nurses are on the frontlines delivering care and ensuring that a patient’s safety and best interest remain at the center of care. Key nursing values promote a holistic approach to patient care – one that incorporates not only clinical responsibilities, but also compassion, cultural sensitivity, situational awareness and tech savviness. Continue reading →

Adapting to the New Wave of Nursing

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doctor or nurse with stethoscope and tablet pcMuch of how we approach healthcare improvements today is focused on physicians. At first blush, this makes sense since traditionally they are perceived as key decision makers. But, it is important to remember that patient care is delivered by collaborative clinical team – including nurses.

As the American Association of Colleges of Nursing notes, nursing is the nation’s largest health care profession, and registered nurses comprise one of the largest segments of the U.S. workforce as a whole. Additionally, the role of nursing in care delivery is growing at the same time that healthcare is experiencing a nurse shortage. Nurses now juggle several fundamental responsibilities including coordinating care, administering medications, interpreting patient diagnostics information, and directing/supervising care. These individuals care for a caseload of anywhere from 1 to 15 patients during an 8-12 hour shift.

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Navigating the Sea of Innovation: Targeting the Right Audience with the Right Tools

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imgresWe are currently at a crossroads in the healthcare industry. Executives are working overtime to try to figure out how to connect and integrate data to best support clinical practice and patient care management. With health systems concerned about balancing both needs, they now need to figure out how to leverage data to get the best value out of their investment. Improvement and innovation in technology are slowly but surely enhancing the industry, but health systems are constantly being assaulted with software companies trying to sell them something. Thus, healthcare executives are left with the eternal question: Which pieces fit together best to create value and improve patient care?

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Keeping up with (and Getting Ahead of) an Ever-Changing Healthcare Model

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At this year’s annual HIMSS conference, a common topic of discussion was around how to continue to bring the technological and medical aspects of healthcare together to evolve, grow and support one another.

Each semester, I share with my Health IT students the many reasons that it is such an exciting time to be in healthcare. As we transition from a volume-based to a value-based incentive model, healthcare is going to look significantly different by 2020. This transformation is no longer a wish, it is no longer an option; it is our collective future. People who were previously one-foot-in and one-foot-out will be fully planted in the value-based healthcare model.

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Why 2015 is the Worst Time to be a Physician

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With the ONC’s recent release of their 10-year interoperability vision, it might seem like the industry is starting to make things easier for clinicians. In reality, 2015 is starting off to be one of the worst times ever to be a physician. Interoperability is a critical issue to support a transition from fee-for-service to value-based care. Physicians will eventually be reimbursed around their ability to impact clinical outcomes, so the need for clinically relevant information at their fingertips is mission critical.

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Healthcare in South Africa – Two Systems, Common Challenges

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When it comes to mHealth, most industrialised nations such as the U.S. and Europe have a head start. Money for healthcare technology investments is available, the infrastructure is in place, and most of the population is already engaged in the healthcare system.

As a country of about 52 million people, South Africa shares many characteristics with its larger brethren. There is a mix of public and private healthcare providers and health insurance plans, physician shortages in key areas, and South Africa is beset by many of the same chronic diseases that industrialised countries face (cardiovascular and obesity-related diseases, diabetes, etc.).

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