Health Management Information Systems, Research Paper Example

Management Information System

Management information systems are the information technology applications intended to ease the management of the organisations as well as the manner in which information is processed and presented to the management. The entire aim of management information systems is to ensure that the efficiency of an organisation is improved as well as the quality of services offered to the clientele or the users of these services or goods are given the best value for money.

The main distinction of management information systems from other information systems is that management information systems are used to query as well as organize other information systems (BPP 2009). The efficiency of management information systems can be determined by their ability to analyze the other information systems and report on the qualities of the systems to enable management make decisions on the ways of improving the systems. The management information system is part of the structured internal control systems. These systems are used in effecting risk management and monitoring strategies as well as help in decision making. Management information systems can be split into three categories namely, decision support systems that are used in gathering vital information for decision making in organisations, the second category is the expert systems used by advanced level management while the last category is the executive systems that helps in data presentation to enable top level management make executive decisions regarding the operations of the organisation (Brien 1999).

Heath care organisations face various challenges in managing their information as well as presenting this information in a manner that makes it easy for the management level to make a decision on the implementation of various. If management information systems are utilised at the appropriate degree of application, they can help solve or reduce the various challenges that face healthcare organisations. The whole idea is to ensure that an organisations strategy is integrated into the information system.

The management information systems in an organisation can be used to improve supply chain efficiency in healthcare organisations. The main problem faced by most healthcare organisations is the synchronising the service delivery and healthcare efforts with the management and supply responsibilities. The clinical, the financial as well as the administrative functions of healthcare organisations need to be able to share information seamlessly to enable the healthcare organisations to operate effectively. The hospital central supply departments are normally situated separately and operated separately from the dispensing clinicians as well as the financial management that is in charge of procurement.  This poses a key challenge in ensuring that the supply levels maintained in the institutions as well as the reorder levels are high enough to ensure that there is no shortage of supplies in the hospitals.

The process of determining the reserve volumes of materials as well as the appropriate times to place reorders takes into mind several considerations. First the management has to determine the existing volumes of supplies and using appropriate computations determine the economic order quantities (EOQs) of the various supplies (BPP 2009). The second factor that management has to consider is the turnaround period for orders to be delivered by the suppliers. This is a key consideration since the period between the placing of and order and the delivery if longer than anticipated can lead to major shortfalls of these materials in the facility. The third factor that the management will need to consider is the ongoing demand for these materials for which the order is being placed.  All these factors coupled with the need for the management to discharge other responsibilities makes their responsibilities the more daunting. The other factor that makes the management of these facilities trickier is because the clinicians who prescribe the medication are not involved in determining the reorder levels as well as the economic order quantities.

The management information system that is to be implemented is for determining the economic order quantity and the reorder levels by using several predetermined parameters. The first step towards the implementation of this system is to ensure that all materials are recorded in an online database once they are ordered. This can be done by ensuring that all materials are bar coded and hence recorded in the system in varied clusters based on their various classifications. Once this is achieved, the system is programmed with minimum quantities below which the system automatically generates a reorder notice. The minimum quantities should be generated by calculating the constants through putting into consideration the turnaround time for this purpose.

These minimum levels have to be arithmetically determined through calculations that will factor in among other things; seasonal fluctuations in demand of certain materials, specific supplier turnaround times as well as the perishability of the various materials. One other factor that is to be considered in determining the reorder levels is the cost of storage of these materials as well as the cost of placing an order. In cases of materials that are expensive to store, it is always desirable to ensure that the reorder levels are placed at the very lowest to ensure that there is no unnecessary backlogs of such materials. For other materials whose cost of reorder is high, its always desirable to ensure that as few orders as possible are done over the financial period. This ensures that the costs likely to be associated with ordering for such materials such as insurance, shipment as well as customs expenses are kept at the bare minimum. These considerations need to be cleared programmed into the system to ensure that the EOQ is appropriately monitored.

Once this is achieved, the second step is to ensure that the various hospital departments use the same database integrated systems to make requisitions as well as lodge their prescriptions through the online database. The entire reason behind this is to ensure that the materials that have been either used or prescribed are recognised in the system immediately. This effectively counters the disconnect that exists between the clinical department, central stores and the administrative cum financial units by ensuring that they have the same information. Once this is achieved, the system is set such that the used materials as well as the prescribed prescriptions are stricken off from the system to ensure that the system only has records of the available materials.

The management of the health care organisation can therefore easily check in the system and monitor the material levels. The system can therefore be set such that at a glance one can determine the trends of usage as well as recurrence of reorder levels of the various materials over time. Such as system ensures that several hurdles that are faced by healthcare organisations on day to day basis are easily overcome. First, the organisation saves costs that are related to the paperwork that goes towards the keeping of records. Efforts that are spent every time in reconciling the used materials with the remaining quantities are saved. The other advantage of the management information system is synchronising the various departments of the healthcare facilities. The doctors, clinicians and all other people can check in the system and easily determine the availability of prescriptions before prescribing them. The management information system is therefore a core system in these facilities. It not only helps improve efficiency in the healthcare organisations but also helps increase the quality of service rendered to the patients. The healthcare organisations are also able to implement appropriate cost cutting measures to avoid wasting manpower in keeping records and tracking material quantities.

There are several other ways that health management information systems can be used in an organisation. The various ways can therefore be implemented and they can go a long way in assisting improve efficiency of healthcare facilities (PWC 2009). Various medical prescription as well as dispensing problems can be solved by use of an appropriate management information system. Similarly other health care monitoring responsibilities such as monitoring of nosocomial infections as well as patient history records can be well kept by use of an appropriate management information system.

References

BPP Learning Media (2009). Management Accounting. London: BPP publishers.

BPP Learning Media (2009). Information Systems.  London: BPP publishers.

’Brien, J (1999). Managing Information Technology in the Internetworked Enterprise. Boston: Irwin McGraw-Hill.

PWC 2009. Leveraging a new generation of health information technology. Retrieved 13 July 2010. http://www.pwc.com/us/en/health-industries/providers/challenges-faced-by-providers.jhtml