How the Information System Can Help to Improve the Health Care System

Question: Analyze that how the information system can help to improve the health care system and provide better health services to the people. Answer: Introduction Johnston and Bate (2013) opined that use of the information technology increases the productivity as well as make the entire operation system reliable of the business firm. This helps in maximizing the customer satisfaction as well as generating high revenue or the turnover of the health care organization (Kellermann and Jones 2013). Use of Information Technology helps in both enhances the capabilities of the present system of the organization as well as the enabling the new or the dynamic capabilities of the organization (Trainor et al., 2014). This assignment describes about the impact of Information Technology (IT) in Healthcare organization. However, this study also analyzes the important of IT for business survival and the usefulness of IT application in healthcare operations. Moreover, risks in IT implementation at Healthcare also analyses through this report. 1. Requirements of IT system at Healthcare The information system in a health organization is used to reduce the diagnostic errors, cost and increase the productivity, improve the patient experience. Providing competitive advantage by the use of data warehousing and data analysis is also an advantage of health information technology. Also in todays scenario, the internet, which is a necessary part of the information technology, helps in collection and exchange of data. Like the elderly patients and the expectant mothers get reminders through the mobile devices to take the medicines on time (West 2012). The IT can help in different aspects of the health care system like human resource management, accounting, finance, operations management etc. Also as the patients expect efficiency and reliability from the health care organizations, from where they are getting the health care. Therefore this reason also promotes the use of IT in the health care organizations. As an example the Bendigo hospitals in Australia is implementing the InterSystems TrakCare unified healthcare. According to the schedule, the system will go live in the year 2017 (Rotter et al. 2014). The solution will help the hospital to accommodate the clinic with the latest design and the technology. In this way, the organization a will get a competitive advantage over the other competitive health care organizations that are not using the information system in their facility. The use of the information system will help in providing the effective efficient and consistent health services. 2. Importance of IT for Business Survival (Health care business) As the use of information, system helps in reducing the operational cost of the organization and provides quality care to the patients then the patients become loyal to that particular organization. The organization can reduce the cost for per admission when the physicians write all the details of the inpatient orders in the computer that is connected to a central medical record system. Similarly, by the use of the health care information system a organization can develop a totally paperless medical record system that can help the organization to run smoothly and d the data can be accessed by different authorized departments, physicians, and officials. All these reasons help a organizations to survive in the competitive market. 3. Requirements to deploy the IT in business Cost evaluation: Before implementing, the IT solution (like transaction processing system, decision support system, management information system) in the organization should run a formal evaluation process that can reduce the possibilities buying inadequate or unnecessary hardware or software. Planning: Before implementing any kind of IT business solutions, an organization should analyze their needs for which they are going to implement the IT solution in the organization. Otherwise, the organization will end up with the undesired result or disastrous result. An effective planning can be a way to achieve the strategic business success (Johnston and Bate 2013). Designing: Since there is an issue of individual perspectives, then something, which is meaningful to an individual, cannot be acceptable to another person. This may happen due to the level of the exposure of the person to the technology due to the reasons like age, gender, education etc. so while designing the health information system the developer must consider that it have to be usable. The developers have developed the system in such a way that it will be simple, natural, consistent, have easy interactions, able to save the context (Wheeler 2015). Equipments: The equipments those are required to implement the health information systems are mainly software and hardware related like workstations, servers, user interfaces etc. Installation: Installation of the new system is related to the changes in the business processes, job assignments, organizational structure, work relationship, determining the roll of every staff on board. Training: One of the important steps in the process of implementing IT solutions in the health organizations is the training of the staff or the employees in the organizations. Since there is resistance from the side of the employees on changing the process in which daily things are done. Therefore, there should be a proper training program for the employees (Ghosh et al., 2013). The top authorities should take care of this training program so that the program can involve as much people as possible. 4. Use of IT in Business (Healthcare) After implementing the IT solutions (like executive information system, decision support system) the organization has to use the solutions so that it can help to grow the business and reduce the previous issue that acts as the obstacles. By implementing the information technology, the health care facility can make it easier to pay the payment for its services. For a health organization, it is important to know it is important to know the patients and serve them well, on time. Use of IT in Healthcare Internally Employees The use of the information system makes it easy for the employee to complete the daily task in much lesser time. So the information system helps them to do research the about the emerging technologies and also about the competitor strategies. Therefore, we can say health information system encourages the innovation in the employees. Staffs For the staffs in the health care organization the information system provides easier way to complete the routine tasks in much lesser time Table 1: IT effects in Internal Environment at Healthcare Use of IT in Healthcare Externally Customers Use of health information system in the health organization help the customers to get the best and efficient health services from the organization. Suppliers The suppliers like the pharmaceuticals suppliers (walgreens ) can have a electronic database that help in providing all the medicines for a prescription nationwide(Kushniruk et al. 2013). Table 2: IT effects in External Environment at Healthcare 5. Advantages of implementing the IT in Healthcare Several advantages are realized by the organization. These advantages can be categorized into the storing and protecting the information, automated processes, remote working and communication. Revenue Generation: The hospitals or the health organizations spent on the health information system but when the cost benefit analysis is done on the investment then it is seen that there will be a rise in the revenue of the organization in long-term (Zalatimo 2014). Since the revenue will increase when the number of the patients will increase or the operating cost will be decreased. Remote working (Flexibility): As there are different, new technologies are emerging like cloud computing, these technologies can help the employees of the organization to work from a remote location. The employees can access the organizations electronic network and work on the go whether they are on the road or at house. In this way, the IT solutions can help in improving the productivity. Communication: In todays business scenario, it is important for the employees of a organization to be connected. The information technology can help in this issue too. Employees can be connected through the e mails, communicate with each other over the video conferencing. Therefore, we can say that there is always a way to communicate and do the business processings. Automation in the business process: The business organizations always try to do more things in lesser time, so that the revenue can be increased by increasing the amount of business. The automation offered by the IT solutions helps in to do so (Cang et al., 2014). In this way, some of the workload can be reduced from the employees, so that the employees can do other important tasks. Whereas the computer will, do the mundane tasks like running the reports, creating the queries, tracking the projects etc. Global access: As on today most of the business houses trying to reach the global market, global consumer groups by using the internet. The existence of the business on the internet makes it easier for the customer to get or order the product anytime anywhere. Consequently, that helps in expanding the business of the company. Reduce Cost: As the information system provide automation support to the health organization then it helps in reducing the cost of day-to-day operation of the health organization (Hibbard et al. 2013) 6. Risks in implementing the IT solutions in Healthcare Operations As the IT solutions implemented in an organization have advantages at the same time they have some security and risk concerns too (Alhawari et al., 2012). Technical risks like phishing, sniffing, denial of services, scanning etc. Also mishandling the system can cause a huge failure. Confidentiality: This kind of risks involves low quality business procedures, lack of policy and standards. The main reasons behind this kind of risks are the lack of trust between the business partners (Cheng et al. 2013). Security: Although the technologies like cloud storages provide organizations huge storage spaces to store its organizational and client data but there are some security issues are also involved with it. Since the cloud provider provides the storage, then it becomes a service and the ownership of the data becomes a security issue to the organization. Privacy: The use of the computerized information system has to protect the privacy of the patients data, provider data (Fernndez-Alemn et al. 2013). The system should properly address to the any unauthorized alteration in the data. Conclusion As the information, technology is being upgraded day by day then the organization has to upgrade with it. So that it can survive in the market and can have a dominating market share. 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