As a nurse facilitator and part of the nursing team that has been mandated with the responsibilities of preparing for the implementation of the EHRs at a small hospital in Upstate New York, I will initiate all possible measures that will guarantee efficiency and success of the system. Consequently, I will address the arranged meeting with high professionalism and competence to ensure that the adoption, implementation, and final operation of the system are perfect. The initial implementation processes of the EHRs system in health centers have played a crucial role in ascertaining the success of the system over the recent years. Hence, there are numerous specific activities and information that I will address to ensure that the meeting is beneficial to every member (Hartley & Jones, 2012).
First, I will explain the underlying relative advantage of adopting the EHRs in the hospital. The EHRs system provides a more accurate and up to date health record compared to the old hospital health record system. Besides, the adoption of the EHRs will boost the efficiency of referencing for the health information of different patients. Hence, the adoption of the system will enable the health providers to offer timely medical attention to their patients. In retrospect to that, the adoption of the EHRs will have the relative advantage of guaranteeing accuracy and privacy in keeping the health records of the patients in the hospital. There will be more eligibility and better documentation of the patient health records through the implementation of the EHRs in the hospital compared to the old patient record system. The adoption of the EHR system will offer a better and more convenient platform for sharing of patient information from different health setups compared to the traditional healthy record system. Therefore, then system will typically facilitate the provision of correct clinical decisions and assist in improving the patient outcomes in the long run (Rogers, 2003).
Second, the implementation team should understand that the new EHRs are more compatible with the current values and practices in the sector of health care. Patient record and data should be captured with absolute accuracy and precision through the adoption of the new EHR system thus upholding the required nursing practices and values. Furthermore, the adoption of the new EHR system will prove to be compatible with the existing health practice in the hospital because it will improve the safety of the patients and the general quality of service delivery in the hospital. Therefore, every responsible member should carry out their duties and responsibilities in initiating for a successful implementation of the new EHR system in the hospital to ensure that the current required health values and practices are upheld and continued (Rogers, 2003).
Third, all adoption team and members should understand that there is room for further trial on the underlying capabilities that have not yet been exploited. The potential abilities of the system should be exploited as far as they are for the better good of the patients and the hospital as a whole. Members should also feel free to recommend about the possible solutions to the potential challenges that may be registered during the implementation and final use of the system in the hospital. All health stake holders should support interoperability capabilities of the new system and provide a convenient environment for efficient sharing of health information both within and outside the hospital set up to ensure that all the underlying capabilities of the new health technology is fully explored for quality service delivery in the hospital (Rogers, 2003).
Finally, the adopter should provide observable results and evidence-based conclusion upon the successful implementation of the system in the hospital. Comparability should be conducted to compare the efficiency of the new system with that of the old health records. Besides, frequent documentation should be carried out to determine whether the new electronic health records have integrated accordingly with the hospital’s practice management or not. Health practices like verification of patient information, insurance eligibility, and health history should be reviewed on frequent basis to ascertain if there is an underlying success in the adoption of the new health record system in the hospital. All members of the deployment team that will bear the responsibility of adopting the system should understand that the fundamental objective of adopting the new system is to improve the quality of service delivery in the hospital’s health system and to guarantee quality patient outcome as a whole. Hence, they should document the observable results of the system in the hospital to offer directive on whether the system is a success or not (Rogers, 2003).
Despite the numerous advantages that the new electronic health record system is required to bring, the implementation team should understand that the system may have challenges. Hence, the resisting team and other concerned stakeholders should be prepared in advance to assist in addressing the challenges and consequently joining hands to guarantee the success of the system (Amatayakul, 2012). Nevertheless, it should be understood that adopting and implementing the system will be an expensive process. Sometimes the hospital will have tom operate under constrained budgets to facilitate the implementation of the hospital. Furthermore, the system requires high technical capabilities to operate. The hospital will typically offer computer trainings to the members to ensure that the responsible stakeholders meet the desired operational requirements of the system. Hence, view the adoption of the system as a technological revelation that should be embraced rather than resisting its implementation (Janssen, 2011).
Nurses should know that they have crucial responsibilities and roles to play to guarantee success in the adoption of the system. Nurses should have computer literacy and technical understanding of the new system. Also, nurses should support and embrace the implementation of the new technology. Consequently, they should play an upper role in ascertaining the arising challenges that are likely to arise in the adoption of the system and provide possible solutions. Contrary to that, nurses should improve their precision, accuracy, and judgment capabilities to facilitate the success of the system. Thankfully, the new health record system will bring positive changes in the health records of different health set ups. Nurses should embrace the change and offer their assistance in its adoption process for the better good of their respective hospital set ups and the health sector as a whole (Janssen, 2011).
The adoption of the new EHR system should be put into meaningful use. Nurses should bear the responsibility of facilitating proper exchange and integration of the health records from different sources to facilitate the objectivity success of putting the system into meaningful use. Far from that, nurses will play an important role in the adoption of the new health technology by conducting further research on the possible ways of improving the system. Obviously, the adoption of the system will have implementation challenges that will be addressed through research practices. Moreover, nurses should explore further capabilities that can be brought forth by the new electronic health record system to ensure exhaustive exploitation of the system (Janssen, 2011). The basic requirement that will facilitate the achievement of success in the implementation of the new health record system will be allowing for free sharing of health records and information in different health set ups. Therefore, nurses should ensure that they have leveraged their data entry precision for accuracy of patient information. Consequently, precise entry of patient data will prevent challenges like duplication of patient records, improper naming of the patients, and incorrect patient demography amongst other associated challenges (Janssen, 2011).
- Amatayakul, M. (2012). Electronic health records: A practical guide for professionals and organizations. Chicago, IL: American Health Information Management Association.
- Hartley, C., & Jones, E. (2012). EHR implementation a step-by-step guide for the medical practice. Chicago, Ill.: American Medical Association.
- Janssen, D. G. (2011). The effect of nursing leadership and teaching methodologies on the level of adoption of an electronic health record (EHR) implementation.
- Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.). New York, NY: Free Press.
