The landscape of the healthcare industry changes and evolves regularly. But the recent trends and technological advancements are significantly impacting health informatics. Furthermore, as health informatics acts as the point of intersection between healthcare services and information technology, its impact is crucial when focusing on global health.
As new technologies emerge in the healthcare industry, professionals gain a wealth of important information due to this progress that helps them provide quality services. Therefore, if healthcare professionals aim to succeed in the industry, they must learn to leverage the available data and use it to improve the healthcare system. For this purpose, only advanced information technology can aid the progress. Here, we are going to discuss the impacts of emerging technology on health informatics.
Informatics will need to develop more skills
As the electronic health record system improves in the healthcare setting, it is most likely that advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence will take over this job. For example, Clinical Decision Support Systems (CDSS) are helping healthcare professionals make better decisions and improve patient outcomes. These systems analyze the patient’s record and medical history in the Electronic Health Record System. After reading the data, it provides healthcare professionals with different prompts that assist them in doing their job. Keeping these technologies in mind, it is safe to say that AI will continue to evolve, and soon it will be able to predict and analyze the patient’s condition and treatment plans. The AI system will use the patient’s medical history, their genetic predisposition and accumulate large-scale data to generate helpful prompts.
However, experts in health informatics will have to work closely with healthcare professionals to make such an advanced AI system work. To improve usability and assistance, they will need to customize, update, and configure the system. They will also have to take feedback and work on overcoming the system’s flaws and improving its design. For this reason, health informatics professionals will have to develop many interpersonal skills that were not a requirement for the job in the past.
Develop a deeper understanding of current clinical workflow
To fully understand the extent of the tech’s usability, health informatics will need more profound knowledge about the nitty-gritty details of clinical work. These details can help them understand the impact of technology and how it can change the industry’s workflow.
The healthcare industry will become more dependent on artificial intelligence and electronic data acquisition and records in the near future. When these technological aspects take the lead in the industry, health informatics will have to handle the tech aspects and bridge the gap between clinical workers and tech experts. In addition, their responsibilities will include guiding the healthcare service providers about how they can use this technology effectively and improve patient outcomes.
Let us take the example from a pharmaceutical setting. Using CPOE systems or robots to check prescriptions is a more efficient way to ensure that the patient’s current order is more reliable and error-free than having people do this task. Physicians and nurses can also connect with the CPOE system to automatically dispense a prescription from the cabinet. However, if health informatics technologies don’t have proper knowledge and understanding of the current pharmaceutical process, they can’t help in a smooth transition.
Understand system vulnerabilities
As the technology advances, it also becomes crucial to understand the system’s vulnerabilities and vital points. Therefore, health informatics will need to be familiarized with both the clinical and technological aspects of the work. Otherwise, both the patient and the physician will have a hard time trusting this technology. This factor can have adverse effects, and the original purpose of automation and technological advancement will become futile. Furthermore, once the progress aspect sidetracks, it can cause many other issues that can affect patient outcomes. But if health informatics experts have adequate training to deal with system vulnerabilities, they will be able to update the technology according to unique healthcare demands.
Informaticists must solve interoperability and integration issues
Wide-scale technological innovation and advancements in the healthcare industry are difficult because the healthcare systems aren’t aligning with each other. When they don’t work together, it creates issues and barriers in clinical understanding and technological comprehension of the new tech products. You can observe these issues in the way electronic health records are transferred between different institutions.
In some cases, institutions don’t have the required technology for a smooth transfer, and they must downgrade to get the job done. However, the success of healthcare technology depends upon interconnectivity and interoperability. For example, if patients are using personal medical devices, the AI must gather data and transfer it smoothly to concerned segments. However, this major issue needs to be addressed if health informatics is to catch up with all these healthcare and technological aspects.
Conclusion
To progress in the current stage of technological evolutions, the health informatics section of the industry will have to make sure that they have qualified experts to lead the projects. These experts should be able to handle interoperability projects and help in improving integration in the industry. Such steps will ensure the effectiveness of technological advancements, which will eventually improve patient outcomes. However, it is only possible if health informatics and the healthcare industry agree to establish a smooth connection and cooperate with each other.
