The Facilities are Characterized by Treatment Variations

The Facilities are Characterized by Treatment Variations
In the current age, healthcare facilities are seeking alternative ways the delivery quality and affordable care to patients. Despite this, the facilities are characterized by treatment variations, unsafe practices, and increased patient mortality rates across healthcare facilities. An emerging recommendation to address the challenges is the integration of information technologies to improve the quality of care and reduce the costs of healthcare services delivered. However, implementing information technologies requires a detailed plan with essential considerations for achieving primary targets and overall success. There are different requirements for successfully implementing health information technologies for quality improvement and cost reduction. Since most healthcare facilities are adopting clinical information systems, exploring the flow of clinical and non-clinical data in an inpatient electronic health system is necessary. The discussion begins from the provision of laboratory reports, through various data points, to the final stage of discharge after treatment, establishing a foundation for recovery.
Laboratory Report- Emergency Department
Laboratory reports are critical components in the patient’s disease management. The advancement of diagnostic procedures, equipment, and facilities facilitates diagnosis optimization and the development of efficient individual treatment plans (Harith et al., 2016). Further, the authors note an increase in the reliance on laboratory reports through the shift in the demand for critical service among physicians in different healthcare facilities. As healthcare facilities integrate information technology systems, including laboratory results is becoming commonplace. The automation of sharing information necessitates smooth sharing between providers and patients, optimizing the patients’ clinical outcomes. Most data available in the electronic systems across health facilities are generated from laboratory results. The information is available through the transmission from the on-site laboratory to the electronic systems in the facility (Kratz, 2016). Individuals with access to the reports can access other critical details, including the time and date of the collection and release of results.
The best laboratory data should be supported by health information systems employed by independent laboratories that are mostly, though not continually, included in the inpatient EMR system. More specifically, laboratory data for inpatient EMR systems include lab results and orders. Accordingly, the coding requirements for lab results and lab orders include the Current Procedural Terminology (CPT), the Systematized Nomenclature of Medicine (SNOMED), and the Logical Observation Identifiers Names and Codes (LOINC) (Gliklich et al., 2019). Today, there exists no compulsory lab coding system for inpatient EMRs, and many health care professionals depend on localized coding structures for lab results or orders. This constrains the multi-site EMR-derived lab information interoperability in the context of registries. Further, healthcare organizations might employ precise laboratory tests to assess a similar analyte, each incorporating a u...