Friday, April 3, 2015

Healthcare Informatics at a Glance


One may wonder, what does technology and informatics have to do with nursing? Well nursing involves delivering a service, making sure that patients are safe, and the care that they receive is simply the best. What better way than to utilize technology to ensure that all of those standards are met. Back in the day, where paper charting was the only option communication among multidisciplinary fields was extremely difficult.  Today, in the 21st century, we have advanced technology, super speed communication, and the ability to share information and knowledge instantly. The management of information and communication technologies will promote health in ways that we've never imagined! Healthcare informatics is a way of globally integrating researchers, clinical care, educators, consultants, information technology, policy makers, and healthcare providers which will promote the best practice in healthcare. (IMIA, 2015) Healthcare is advanced through informatics in ways such as using evidenced based practice and research, a national data and communication infrastructure, research that turns ideas into practice, accessable information, and knowledge on inter-professionals from across the world. (AMIA, 2015) Being able to access information at the touch of a button enables different fields to interact with one another and ensure an efficient and continuous healthcare delivery cycle. 
Nurses are constantly swamped with patients, a number of different tasks, making sure their patients are safe, charting, talking to family members and doctors, and many many more. The implementation of an electronic health record (EHR) has improved quality, safety, and efficiency of care delivered through increased productivity, improved performance, enhanced effectiveness, and supported clinical care and research. (Nelson & Stagger, p.g. 97) The EHR has an alert system that notifies the nurse of any missed task, upcoming procedure, medication error possibility, just to name a few. This new alert system helps a nurse maintain organized to decrease events such as medication error and essentially increase patient safety and safe delivery of health care services. Learning about healthcare informatics will equip nurses and other healthcare providers with clinical skills, information technology, leadership, and management skills that will ensure a progressively better healthcare delivery system that is patient centered. 

References
AMIA. Nursing Informatics. (n.d.). Retrieved April 3, 2015, from https://www.amia.org/programs/working-groups/nursing-informatics
IMIA. The IMIA Vision | IMIA - International Medical Informatics Association. (n.d.). Retrieved April 3, 2015, from http://www.imia-medinfo.org/new2/node/31
Nelson, R. & Staggers. (2014). Health informatics: An interprofessional approach (Vol. 1). St. Louis, Missouri: Elsevier/Mosby.

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