Technologies in Healthcare Industry - Essay Sample

Introduction

The healthcare industry has been harnessing emerging technologies for discovery, research, and improved healthcare delivery (Fernández, 2017). Innovation in healthcare: harnessing new technologies is an article by Eugenio Fernández describing how meaningful use in healthcare has enabled the application and discovery of new technology to advance healthcare delivery. There have emerged healthcare organizational imperatives in today's arena, including the provision of high quality and affordable healthcare, improved access to care, attainment of client loyalty, and improved clinical service reliability and quality (Fernández, 2017).

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Clinical Research

Meaningful use has helped us understand the numerous benefits of reusing EHR data for clinical research in today's arena (Nordo et al., 2019). Use of EHRs data for clinical research: Historical progress and current applications is an article by Nordo et al. describing the above concept. The article explains that through data acquisition in clinical research studies, there is an opportunity to develop new patient therapies at low cost and improved health cycle teaching (Nordo et al., 2019). Today, Clinical research and care have been bridged by leveraging the latest technologies to transfer data from EHRs into the clinical research databases

Today, healthcare organizations are thinking that it is time to fix Meaningful Use in health affairs to enable the use of health IT to improve healthcare quality for patients and appropriately improve quality for special populations through their engagement (Emani et al., 2017). Also, the early focus on adopting new technology by EHRs needs to be shifted towards outcome measures since most hospitals have EHRs in place (Murphy et al., 2020). Reflecting on their thought about Meaningful Use today, it has been clear that healthcare organizations have been receiving incentives to have in place efficient EHR systems focusing on cost, quality, and improvement in clinical practice activities. However, physicians' meaningful use of EHR technology must be reimbursed to reflect patients' outcomes (Nordo et al., 2019).

EHR Technology

The status for hospitals and physicians concerning complying with the MU objectives is that those who fail to comply with the goals will receive a penalty in the form of reduced Medicare reimbursements (Practice facilitation handbook, n.d). To avoid the penalty, they should use certified EHR technology and demonstrate MU by an attestation process at the end of every MU reporting period. Reflecting on it, complying with MU objectives should be based on efficiency, interoperability, quality, and performance where the patient outcome is the key rather than reducing reimbursements by using compliance measures like data collection and patient participation (Karmen, 2016.

The future of MU will result in better clinical outcomes since appropriate use of EHR technology allows more significant analysis in treatment trends and diagnosis hence giving optimal care to patients (Evans, 2016). EHRs can positively impact patient health across an entire population, leading to improved population health outcomes in the future (Fernández, 2017). Also, through MU, future patients will be able to engage in strategic efforts and have knowledge regarding their healthcare choices (Evans, 2016). There also will be more clinical research as a result of the use of EHR data. The potential impact of all the above will be reduced costs and improved patient outcomes (Murphy et al., 2020). Reflecting on it, meaningful service for EHRs is crucial in the healthcare industry as through it, more advancements are realized, and the future of improved healthcare delivery is inevitable.

Conclusion

Today, Regional Extension Centers (REC) still exists. More have been established to optimize EHR use so that the providers can be meaningful users, take part in healthcare transformation, and get involved in payment delivery reform programs (practice facilitation handbook, n.d). Their role has not changed since they still are the providers of on-ground technical assistance to individuals and small medical practices providers lacking the resources to implement and maintain EHRs and those providing primary healthcare services in public, hospitals, community health centers, and other settings (practice facilitation handbook, n.d). Reflecting on it, RECs should always stay focused and involved with their practice to provide continuous support to the involved stakeholders. Simultaneously, their role should be diversified to ensure their involvement in monitoring the EHR systems put in place.

References

Emani, S., Ting, D. Y., Healey, M., Lipsitz, S. R., Karson, A. S., & Bates, D. W. (2017). Physician beliefs about the meaningful use of the electronic health record: a follow-up study. Applied clinical informatics, 8(4), 1044. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5802309/

Evans, R. S. (2016). Electronic health records: then, now, and in the future. Yearbook of medical informatics, 1 (48). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5171496/

Fernández, E. (2017). Innovation in healthcare: Harnessing new technologies. Information Systems (JMWAIS), 2017(2), 8.
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/35a3/960b2242321ac408a37c2c1b466011dbb413.pdf

Karmen, W. (2016). Electronic health records and meaningful use in local health departments: updates from the 2015 NACCHO informatics assessment survey. Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, 22, 27-33. https://journals.lww.com/jphmp/fulltext/2016/11001/electronic_health_records_and_meaningful_use_in.7.aspx

Murphy, Z. R., Wang, J., & Boland, M. V. (2020). Association of Electronic Health Record Use Above Meaningful Use Thresholds With Hospital Quality and Safety Outcomes. JAMA network open, 3(9) https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/articlepdf/2770283/murphy_2020_oi_200473_1598907921.07033.pdf

Nordo, A. H., Levaux, H. P., Becnel, L. B., Galvez, J., Rao, P., Stem, K., ... & Kush, R. D. (2019). Use of EHRs data for clinical research: Historical progress and current applications. Learning health systems, 3(1) https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/lrh2.10076

Practice facilitation handbook (n.d). Electronic Health Records and Meaningful Use. AHRQ. https://www.ahrq.gov/ncepcr/tools/pf-handbook/mod17.html.