Selecting an Effective EHR System for a Health Clinic: A Physician-Led Process

Electronic Health Records (EHRs) are essential in helping health practitioners complete their various tasks with ease and manage the maintenance of health facilities. Thus, it is a vital initiative to select an effective EHRs system with universal usability and acceptable to all the team members in the clinic. Besides, it should be a physician-led process; not one delegated to specific individuals in the management. It is the physicians who will be using the system after its selection and establishment are complete. Therefore, the focus is on constructing a team that will develop an effective EHRs system, evaluate theories of management change, implement strategic plans, and understands procurement processes.

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Part 1: Construction of a Team

In the selection process, it is essential to have a precise and clear strategy that concerns the value that the proposed system will add to the clinic's mission. On the other hand, a clear and effective strategy depends on conducting the right assessment of the opportunities and challenges that the clinic's technological infrastructure is currently facing (Polhemus et al., 2019). The key players in the selected team become the best source of information where the clinic will base its strategy development and, later, the selection of the EHRs system. Also, based on the level of interest stakeholders possess in technology-related decision making and information they have that is useful in optimizing decision making, it is crucial to consult stakeholders during selection.

Critical stakeholders in the selection processes include clinicians who are essential due to their position at the helm of providing clinical services. By being attentive to disagreements on processes and priorities, clinicians are vital in providing information about workflow sign-off processes, life support, and design of the system. Similarly, office managers and staff are also relevant stakeholders because they will be playing a part in the billing and recording of both demographic and contact information of the clients to the clinic. Office managers' contribution to the process is crucial because they will contribute to the challenges and opportunities concerning the usage of EHRs systems.

To finance the clinical practices, having a representative from the billing team is also crucial in selecting the EHRs system. This department needs an integrated system that will work well with the existing one; therefore, the team will be able to provide information regarding efficiency in terms of accuracy and speed of working with the system. Also, the administration must play the part because any department's decisions must seek approval by the administration before its implementation takes the course. Therefore, the selection team will have a representative of the administration department to play a part in either accepting the project or putting an end to it altogether. Finally, the team must have a representative from the marketing department because the department has a vital role to play in the selection and implementation of the system. That is to say; they will create an in-depth analysis of the needs of the clinical practices. Additionally, besides increasing revenue, the marketing team may also play a part in engaging patients who may be accessing the HER through the clients' portal.

Part 2: Change Management Theories Concepts

In the change-making process, active management is crucial in implementing change strategies because it is essential to focus on suitable plans and avoid irrelevant changes. The process of change management is continuous that needs time, dedication, proper expertise, and efforts to implement and sustain. Furthermore, it may not work if left to be a one-person show in the entire organization; therefore, it is essential to have other staff members' involvement because these changes will also affect them. Notably, before the clinic adopts any management models, the selection team must understand the need for the change and how it stands to benefit the clinic (Pannick et al., 2016). There could use several models, including Lewin's change management model, McKinsey 7 S model, Kotter's and Nudge theories, ADKAR, and Bridge transition models; the clinic must choose the most appropriate one.

All of the available models are essential in all their capacities. Still, the clinic must consider that there will be critical challenges that will arise as a result of the transition. Having considered this initiative to be a new one, the staff will have to grapple with adjusting with it as they go through the transition period. Some of the challenges that the team will have to consider are the usability and efficiency of the system and the changes it will bring forth to the staff's daily performance. As one of the significant challenges, and before its implementation, the management should consider the Lewin's change management model that requires the staff first to unfreeze. Unfreezing will help the staff prepare for the change by eradicating any resistance that may arise as a result of the change itself. After that, the team will face the change, and the model later requires it to refreeze. That is to say, the team has successfully gone through acceptance, implementation of the change. Notably, a section of the Bridge transitional model is also viable in the process as it embraces the ending, losing and letting go protocol.

Part 3: Implementation of the Departmental Strategic Plan

To successfully implement risk mitigation strategies posed by the HER system selection, the clinic must choose effective means for excellent outcomes. According to Dameski (2018), for every risk that an entity may experience or is a potential one, it must deal with it. Therefore, the best recommendation would be to sequentially follow avoid, accept, reduce, control, or transfer procedure depending on the magnitude of the risk. Furthermore, within then the clinic's risk management framework, managers should be aware of strategies and the guidelines used to implement them for successful mitigation of the risks. As they are aware of the potential risks that may arise as a result of the transition, the management will make decisions concerning risks every day.

Part 4: Purpose of the Procurement Process

In implementing a new HER system, the procurement of various assets will be essential at later stages, making the procurement process purposeful. Some of the documents critical for this process include Request for Proposal, Request for Information, and Request for Quotation. Notably, a Request for Proposal is a tool that companies use to ensure they procure both competitively prices goods for their operations. It is an essential tool because it describes the needs of the company, invites competitive bids for better deals, compares service providers for better deals, and maintains the budget within reach of the company.

Similarly, request for information is also a vital tool that customers use to collect information written regarding the potential of different suppliers, which they use to inform buying decisions (Kumar et al., 2018). These tools are majorly useful in determining which suppliers will be suitable for meeting the buyer's needs. In many instances, Request for Proposal becomes a particular type of Request for Information tool. On the other hand, Request for Quotation is a tool that buyers use to request a quote from suppliers to assist in purchasing certain commodities. Therefore, it generally means call for bids or invitation for bids because the buyer sends it out to more than one supplier.

Conclusion

Selecting and implementing a new EHRs system calls for a clinic facility to go through intense processes, as discussed above, to ensure a successful transition. It is how the transition occurs that determines whether the new EHRs system is worth the efforts or is a waste of time. Therefore, the formation of the systems selection and implementation teams is a crucial startup process that the clinic must take a keen interest in to have a good start. Besides, the process should embrace the importance of the change management process, the implementation of departmental strategic plans, and professional procurement procedures.

References

Dameski, A. (2018, August). A comprehensive ethical framework for AI entities: Foundations. In International Conference on Artificial General Intelligence (pp. 42-51). Springer, Cham.

Kumar, A., Pal, A., Vohra, A., Gupta, S., Manchanda, S., & Dash, M. K. (2018). Construction of capital procurement decision-making model to optimize supplier selection using Fuzzy Delphi and AHP-DEMATEL. Benchmarking: An International Journal.

Pannick, S., Sevdalis, N., & Athanasiou, T. (2016). Beyond clinical engagement: a pragmatic model for quality improvement interventions, aligning clinical and managerial priorities. BMJ quality & safety, 25(9), 716-725.

Polhemus, A. M., Kadhim, H., Barnes, S., Zebrowski, S. E., Simmonds, A., Masand, S. N., ... & Dupont, M. (2019). Accelerating adoption of patient-facing technologies in clinical trials: a pharmaceutical industry perspective on opportunities and challenges. Therapeutic Innovation & regulatory science, 53(1), 8-24.