The electronic health records have many functions and advantages. Many health experts believe that the EHRs can largely help in improving access to the clinical data and improving patient care. The core functions of electric health records include the management of data, order management, decision support, and patient support, enabling administrative processes, result management, reporting, and health information of the patients. The advantages of the electric health records include the following:
Enabling accessibility of patient records to aid more efficient and coordinated care.
Providing an up to date, factual and clear information about patients during any point of need.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Sharing clinical information securely with other clinicians and patients.
Helping care providers to conduct effective diagnosis to patients thus reducing medical errors and providing safer care.
Improving communication and interactions between the patients and the care providers as well as improving convenience of healthcare.
Ensuring that prescription is safer and reliable.
Ensuring that there is accurate, complete and legible documentation.
Ensuring that there are security and privacy of the patient's data.
Ensuring that the providers can improve their productivity and balance between life and work.
The forms which are used in keeping information of patients in the electric health record include HIPAA consent forms, consent to treatment forms and discharge forms. Often, consent forms are used in cases of patients who get admission to the emergency room, physical examination at the doctor's office or any admission into the hospital. The consent forms are meant to give consent to the hospital or the doctor to start treating patients. The patient may agree or fail to agree to get treatment. HIPAA consent form is one through which the patient sign acknowledging receipt of the privacy practices notices. This form may be included or not on the registration form. Discharge forms are normally used by patients who stay in the hospital for more than two days. Normally, the doctor may conduct more tests before discharging the patient. The doctor may also issue a follow-up visit or may write a referral to other care providers depending on the condition of the patient.
A care organization using Electronic Health Record views the organization through the electronic lens. The organization ensures that they manage the workflow to help in maximizing the efficiencies, enhancing the safety and quality of healthcare as well as clearing chaos that may exist in the current workflow and improving care coordination.
The workflow of organizations with Electronic Health Records involves managing messages, scheduling patients, checking patients in, monitoring patients' rooms, conducting tests on patients, renewing medications and finally checking outpatients. The Electronic Health Records may fail to work perfectly on the first try. After working with the EHRs for some time, the new users may identify certain failures or inefficiencies that may hinder the smooth transition. However, with time, the users get used to the system and work on improving them. The optimization of the electronic health record project requires putting together hospital leaders and workflow and technology experts. The team may work to put up goals for the project and developing technological fixes so that they can achieve the organization's goals.
Care coordination involves smooth communication between the different members of the care team about a patient's condition and care given to the patient. Through smooth coordination and communication, a team can do away with unnecessary treatments or duplicate tests thus saving money and time. The robust information exchange helps in managing the patient's condition and delivering the best care. The organization streamlines improvement of clinical documentation. One of the primary functions of Electronic Health Record is clinical documentation and coding the clinical status of a patient. Care providers can help in improving the quality of care and improving the efficiency of the hospital.
