Emergence of Novel Healthcare Technologies

If you were to ask 10 people what they believe to be the most significant issue facing healthcare today, you might get 10 different answers. Escalating costs? Regulation? Technology disruption? These and many other topics are worthy of discussion. Not surprisingly, much has been said in the research, within the profession, and in the news about these topics. Whether they are issues of finance, quality, workload, or outcomes, there is no shortage of changes to be addressed. In this Discussion, you examine a national healthcare issue and consider how that issue may impact your work setting. You also analyze how your organization has responded to this issue. To Prepare: Review the Resources and select one current national healthcare issue/stressor to focus on. Reflect on the current national healthcare issue/stressor you selected and think about how this issue/stressor may be addressed in your work setting. Post a description of the national healthcare issue/stressor you selected for analysis, and explain how the healthcare issue/stressor may impact your work setting. Then, describe how your health system work setting has responded to the healthcare issue/stressor, including a description of what changes may have been implemented. Be specific and provide examples.Emergence of Novel Healthcare Technologies

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Emergence of Novel Healthcare Technologies as a Healthcare Issue of Concern/ Stressor

One of the inevitable developments in healthcare today is the adoption of new technological innovations that are meant to improve healthcare delivery. However, majority of the healthcare workforce suddenly find themselves unskilled in their use because they were not trained in these technologies at the time of graduation (McGonigle & Mastrian, 2017). Most of these are technological applications that are embedded in the healthcare organization’s electronic health records (EHR) system and include automated medication dispensing cabinets (ADC), clinical decision support (CDS), computerized provider order entry (CPOE), patient data management systems (PDMS), bar code medication administration (BCMA), and electronic medication administration record (eMAR) amongst many others (Islam et al., 2018; Alotaibi & Federico, 2017). The impact of this in the work setting is that efficiency may go down as nurses and other healthcare workers lack competency in their use. Medical and nursing errors may also paradoxically increase in rate due to incompetence. Lastly, there may be a high turnover of staff who are frustrated because they cannot cope with the demands of the new innovative technologies.Emergence of Novel Healthcare Technologies

Luckily, the health system work setting in the author’s organization has responded proactively to this potential stressor. The most important response was the organization of upskilling training for all staff that would be deemed to require the direct use of these technologies in the completion of their patient care and treatment duties. The second response was to employ a nurse informaticist who would oversee the technologies and also serve as a trainer of other staff and resource person. Examples of changes that have been implemented in the organization are training of all nurse managers by the nurse informaticist and movement from paper-based nursing documentation to an electronic-based system.

References

Alotaibi, Y., & Federico, F. (2017). The impact of health information technology on patient safety. Saudi Medical Journal, 38(12), 1173–1180. https://doi.org/10.15537/smj.2017.12.20631

Islam, M.M., Poly, T.N., & Li, Y.-C. (2018). Recent advancement of clinical information systems: Opportunities and challenges. Yearbook of Medical Informatics, 27(01), 083–090. https://doi.org/10.1055/s-0038-1667075

McGonigle, D., & Mastrian, K.G. (2017). Nursing informatics and the foundation of knowledge, 4th ed. Jones & Bartlett Learning.

Emergence of Novel Healthcare Technologies