2009-07-14
Hard to Use Health Information Systems
At three recent medical visits, the nurse or physician made comments to me on their health information system (the same one). I doubt they knew that I worked in the domain. The thrust of all three of their comments was that their need to interact with the system impeded the flow of their work and the personal attention they wanted to give to their patients. For example, before administering a medication, one has to
- Scan the patient’s bracelet.
- Confirm the patient’s identity.
- Scan the medication bar code.
- Confirm the choice of medication.
- Confirm that, yes, one actually has just administered the medication to the patient.
The caregivers agreed that it was important to keep good records; one of them said that, in her thirty years’ experience, she had always kept paper records. Had she forgotten how hard it was to keep paper records, more often after the fact than at the point of care? Could it be the very length of their experience that made it hard for them to adapt to the use of electronic medical records? Might it be that the technology is still too immature to support ease of use? Would there be a way to make their existing system easier to use, through training, reconfiguration, or redesigned work flow?
Rich Analysis 