EHR Adoption Assumptions
Health information technology (HIT) is moving the health sector to another level due to the improved quality of service provision in the healthcare settings. Bethany Long-term Care facility is not left behind technology wise as it is almost adopting the Electronic health record (EHR) system to replace the old manual system of record keeping in the facility. For any healthcare organization to adopt a new system, assumptions must be made to provide a guide and speculation for the new system. During the estimation of the financial requirements for adoption of the new EHR system in Bethany, several assumptions were made. The paper describes the assumptions and how they relate to the budget made in the HIT Pro Forma Template.
The new technology is likely to play a central role in the needed transformation of healthcare in the institution. Adoption of the electronic health record in the facility will replace the old manual system, and it is likely to bring changes in the quality of services provided to the patients. The budget proposed has heavily invested in the capital cost so that the new system is financially supported. The total capital cost for the first Fiscal Year is estimated to be at $32800.
The second assumption is that the new technology will work effectively in Bethany as in the other healthcare organizations. Research conducted reveals that many institutions are using the EHR system to provide services to the patients (Henry et al., 2016). Statistics from the HIT system in the United States reveals that over 96% of hospitals have an efficient certified EHR system (Wager et al., 2017). The Fiscal year budget has funds allocated for consultation with other institutions and technology stakeholders to ensure that the system works well in the institution.
Adoption of an electronic health record system in Bethany forms one of the best innovations that have been done since the organization started. The major assumption made is that the EHR will have a positive impact on the problems affecting healthcare systems such as medical errors, but it will need a high investment cost. The administrative and maintenance costs of EHRs are often high, a reason why the investment and maintenance costs are high according to the budget (Meeks et al., 2014). A lot of money has been allocated to the capital and operating costs of the EHR system to ensure that the whole process is a success.
References
Henry, J., Pylypchuk, Y., Searcy, T., & Patel, V. (2016). Adoption of electronic health record systems among US non-federal acute care hospitals: 2008-2015. The Office of National Coordinator for Health Information Technology.
Wager, K. A., Lee, F. W., & Glaser, J. P. (2017). Health care information systems: a practical approach for health care management. John Wiley & Sons.
Meeks, D. W., Smith, M. W., Taylor, L., Sittig, D. F., Scott, J. M., & Singh, H. (2014). An analysis of electronic health record-related patient safety concerns. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, 21(6), 1053-1059.
