Question

Describe why vendors should strive to develop Electronic health record systems that accommodate clinician’s workflow and explain how understanding team workflows can influence health IT usability?

Answer 1

1)Ans) A vendor assessment is the process of collecting information on several vendors and narrowing the vendor field before selecting an EHR system. The challenge of narrowing a large field of available options to a manageable number of vendors can be daunting, but it is a critical step in your transition to health IT
The arrival of the electronic health record (EHR) in healthcare has brought just as many challenges as it has benefits, with patient advocates often citing poor EHR usability as the root cause of adverse patient safety events.

To enhance EHR usability, and to reduce patient harm, the Pew Charitable Trusts, in collaboration with the American Medical Association (AMA) and Medstar Health, convened a panel of providers, EHR vendors, and health IT experts to develop recommendations and criteria that will ensure optimal performance throughout the EHR lifecycle.

“Current certification tests are focused on evaluating the usability of key system requirements,” the organizations wrote.

“Several additional best practices, criteria, and factors emerged from the expert panel discussions that could help EHR developers and health care facilities improve product usability and safety. These criteria could provide the foundation for a voluntary certification program.”
“Developers should follow principles of user-centered design, such as by obtaining frequent user feedback at multiple points in development and establishing user ‘personas’ that reflect the typical needs of different types of clinicians,” the team wrote.

Vendors can also observe clinical workflows and request provider contributions to shaping the product’s usability.

In addition to being mindful of EHR design, developers and providers should consider the possible issues that come with EHR optimization and customization.

“As customization in each facility is unique based on its workflows, configuration can help optimize the safe use of the system. However, customization can also introduce risk,” advised the panel.

The experts suggested that vendors provide evidence-based feedback from previous implementations and customizations before making changes to existing workflows.
Providers looking to optimize their health IT systems should communicate their reasons for these proposed changes to vendors and assess their organizations’ capacity to customize EHRs.

If vendors do make customizations to the EHR, clinicians should document the changes and develop risk mitigation plans for each modification.

To enhance EHR usability, and to reduce patient harm, the Pew Charitable Trusts, in collaboration with the American Medical Association (AMA) and Medstar Health, convened a panel of providers, EHR vendors, and health IT experts to develop recommendations and criteria that will ensure optimal performance throughout the EHR lifecycle.

“Current certification tests are focused on evaluating the usability of key system requirements,” the organizations wrote.

“Several additional best practices, criteria, and factors emerged from the expert panel discussions that could help EHR developers and health care facilities improve product usability and safety. These criteria could provide the foundation for a voluntary certification program.”

MINDFULLY DESIGNING AND OPTIMIZING EHRS

When designing EHR systems, vendors should prioritize the needs of providers, the experts said.
r-centered design, such as by obtaining frequent user feedback at multiple points in development and establishing user ‘personas’ that reflect the typical needs of different types of clinicians,” the team wrote.

Vendors can also observe clinical workflows and request provider contributions to shaping the product’s usability.

In addition to being mindful of EHR design, developers and providers should consider the possible issues that come with EHR optimization and customization.

“As customization in each facility is unique based on its workflows, configuration can help optimize the safe use of the system. However, customization can also introduce risk,” advised the panel.

The experts suggested that vendors provide evidence-based feedback from previous implementations and customizations before making changes to existing workflows.

tems should communicate their reasons for these proposed changes to vendors and assess their organizations’ capacity to customize EHRs.

If vendors do make customizations to the EHR, clinicians should document the changes and develop risk mitigation plans for each modification.

Prior to implementing an EHR, it is critical that providers and vendors vigorously test the new system.

The panel recommended that test cases feature different types of providers, each with various levels of clinical and technological expertise, to ensure the system works for every end-user and workflow within the organization.

Vendors and providers should also conduct test cases with specific, clinically-oriented goals in mind. Each goal should be paired with clear measures of success and failure.

“The lack of such goals and measures for each test case could complicate the ability to assess the use of EHRs in concrete ways, although goals and measures may vary from implementation to implementation,” the experts said.

The team stressed that test cases must also include known risk areas that rarely occur but can contribute to serious patient harm.

These areas may include routine events with a non-routine action, such as delivering triplets instead of a single patient birth, or complex activities that require difficult cognitive processes, such as integrating clinical information from multiple sources.

“Testing known areas of risk will help to identify these challenges and prevent them from persisting in the product,” the panel wrote.

“Focusing on areas that could produce inefficiencies or challenging tasks can help to implement corrections that can address clinician concerns.”

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