Innovations In Healthcare IT

The ability to remotely monitor biometrics and access better data has far reaching implications for healthcare providers, but according to Good Medicine, these advances come with a caveat:

All of the urgency and activity surrounding IT in healthcare has delivered point solutions that are improving the quality of care, but also introducing more complexity.

The Good News

The key to preventing potential emergencies and caring for emergencies when they occur depends on timing. Remote monitoring and access to biometric data gives doctors a new opportunity to provide the right care at the right time. With the influx of data that can help aid in patient care comes a new burden. The technologies that inform doctors don’t just need to be reliable, they need to be smart. Information delivery needs to be easy to read and provide just the right amount of information.

Improved Access To Cost-Efficient Solutions

Doctors don’t have to be the end of the line for decision making. With improved data delivery, like customizable visualizations, doctors can more effectively identify problems and modes of care for patients. Care programs can be tailored to each patient and monitored without checkups and other time consuming diagnostics.

The Caveat

New tools and information technologies can help doctors accomplish amazing things, but they often rely on an aging IT system. To get the most out of technology, doctors need to focus on the bigger picture. Similar to how patients need expertise from different doctors, dependable, integrated systems requires more than one IT person. Modern doctors offices need a team of IT experts. Doctors are just beginning to remotely monitor their patients, but most IT services have been out of the office for years. Hardware can be outsourced into a data center and software can be maintained, monitored, and upgraded remotely.

“With great power there must also come — great responsibility!” – Stan Lee had it right. With all of the great things doctors can accomplish using new technology, they must also make sure that their technology rests in an experts capable hands.