Importance of Informatics in Healthcare, Research Paper Example

Technology has been impacting healthcare in the recent past positively. Thus today we can get quality health services as a result of technological developments. Informatics in health care involves the use of advanced technology in the nursing fields to acquire particular benefits to the patients. In the medical field. Informatics is utilized in the documentation of patient information electronically. Essentially, health informatics combines the medical field and technology to achieve the best results thus ensuring that costs are reduced and patients receive the best services from a medical facility that utilizes informatics. The area of medical informatics is large and has brought various positive impacts on health care. Therefore more medicals institutions are advised to hire nurses and medical staff that acknowledge and appreciate the health informatics. In this light, this paper explores the importance of health informatics outcome.

One of the positive impacts of informatics in the health care sector is documentation. Electronic keeping of documents has been a success in recent years. Unlike in the past, the records are well collected and stored correctly in a way that they are accessible to relevant people within a hospital setting (McCormick & Saba, 2015).  Information that is collected and stored electronically is kept and can be stored for extended periods unlike having medical records on books that are subject to tire and sometimes even go missing. Moreover, the system helps organize patients’ information accurately so that other medical staff can use the records to treat the patients better. Thus patients are better placed to be treated better when a doctor has previous records of the patients.

Also, informatics in health care has played a vital role in the coordination of nurses and other relevant personnel in a health facility. For everything task that involves several people to be successful, all the people need to work and collaborate as a team. The same can be said in a health facility setting there is a need for doctors, nurses, physicians and laboratory specialists to work hand in hand (McCormick & Saba, 2015). Any form of disconnect may affect patients negatively thus making them suffer by not receiving appropriate care. Informatics enhances coordination of the public in a healthcare setting thus making patients satisfied with the quality of care they receive. This coordination ensures that nurses and patients communicate effectively; thus nurses give patients all necessary information to patients, therefore, making patients satisfied (Nelson & Staggers, 2016).

Experts argue that healthcare informatics helps patents to be satisfied since all of their needs accomplished. Moreover, various experts believe that more research needs to be completed to ensure that effective informatics system is adopted in healthcare so that customers can patients can continue to benefits from technological development (McCormick & Saba, 2015).  Also, to achieve positive patient care outcome, there is a need for all people working in health facilities to work together. Therefore doctors, nurses, lab technicians should combine their efforts to ensure that they bring about positive patient care outcomes.

Positive care outcome that is facilitated by informatics in healthcare requires time. Impacts of informatics are not overnight, and thus it is essential that patients are patient to fully benefit from technology (Nelson & Staggers, 2016). All medical staff should be involved in any technological development initiated in health care to enhance patient, positive care outcomes. Doctors are essential in developing this type of changes since they diagnose and prescribe drugs for patients. Nurses play a pivotal role in positive care outcome since they deal directly with patients (McCormick & Saba, 2015).

Documentation of patient information is shared to relevant medical professionals thus creating an ethical concern. Patient information should be confidential between the doctor and the patients hence when knowledge of a patient is accessible to other medical staff then patient confidentiality is not observed while using modern technology (Nelson & Staggers, 2016). Therefore a balance should be identified, so that patient confidentiality is not ignored in a quest to bring about patient care outcome.

The cost of implementing appropriate technological changes in healthcare to enhance positive patient care outcome is costly. Massive amounts of revenue should be pumped into the health care sector since at the end the money will be beneficial in the long run as patients will receive quality health services (Nelson & Staggers, 2016).  The government is a crucial player in healthcare; therefore it needs to be in the front line by funding technology in healthcare. Also, the nongovernmental organization should also help in research that is aimed at ensuring that patients all receiving quality healthcare (McCormick & Saba, 2015).

In the future, legislation is likely to affect how informatics is incorporated into health care. For instance, it is expected that laws that protect patient information confidentiality. This move will impact how patients are taken care of in health facilities (McCormick & Saba, 2015).  Technological development continues to improve; thus shortly patients will continue to receive better healthcare. Hence all stakeholders should support all forms of technology that helps improve the quality of health care (Nelson & Staggers, 2016).

In conclusion, informatics has positive impacts on the healthcare sector. Some of the benefits that can be linked to informatics in nursing and health care include reducing costs, coordination of health professionals and bringing about shared knowledge between the different professionals while providing care to patients. On the other hands, critics of informatics in hospitals and health facilities argue that technology destroys the relationship between patients and doctors thus making health more impersonal. Nevertheless, technology should continue to be used in hospitals and all health institutions as the benefits of technology out way the negative impacts.

References

McCormick, K., & Saba, V. (2015). Essentials of nursing informatics. McGraw-Hill Education.

Nelson, R., & Staggers, N. (2016). Health Informatics-E-Book: An Interprofessional Approach. Elsevier Health Sciences.