NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

Name

Capella university

NURS-FPX 8012 Nursing Technology and Health Care Information Systems

Prof. Name

Date

SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

In the medical setting, the Electronic Health Record (EHR) system has transformed care provision. The EHR has improved interactions among patients and clinicians. The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) developed the Safety Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience (SAFER) Guides, a collection of suggestions for medical facilities to increase the EHR’s security and efficiency  (Health IT, 2023).

Medical centers like Cleveland Clinic in Ohio frequently utilize EHR to achieve exceptional medical care. However, there is a necessity for EHR reform. An improved EHR system promotes efficient data exchange and patient outcomes (Bhati et al., 2023). The paper assesses the utilization of the enhanced EHR system, concentrating on its conformity to the standards outlined in the SAFER Guideline.

Use of EHR to Drive Improvements in Healthcare Setting

The Cleveland Clinic’s adoption of an advanced EHR is critical to driving clinical practice improvements. This technical solution ensures authorized workers have secure and confidential access to medical data. EHRs facilitate information exchange across medical staff in different sections, including testing facilities, emergency rooms, and other settings. Advanced EHR provides user-friendly features and designs that allow clinicians and staff members to navigate while retrieving patient information quickly.

Its simple layout encourages streamlined and effective practices and lowers employee learning problems (Enahoro et al., 2024). EHR allows medical professionals to access and administer extensive clinical data from a single platform. EHR contains patient data, including medical history, evaluations, therapy regimens, and prescription records. A comprehensive perspective of patient data enables practitioners to make informed decisions and deliver individualized care (Adeniyi et al., 2024).

NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

Advanced EHR offers connectivity, which allows medical information to be exchanged with other systems, including testing facilities, pharmacies, and medical professionals. Advanced EHR implementation eliminates manual data processing and improves coordinated care through precise and promptly available information (Vos et al., 2020). Additionally, EHR includes a Clinical Decision Support System (CDSS) that offers guidelines based on research, notifications, and alerts for immediate assistance during emergency care. Supporting tools help medical professionals make educated decisions following guidelines. For example, medical recommendations offered by EHR assist doctors in providing evidence-based treatment to emergency patients.

It improves patient security and lowers medical expenses by enhancing diagnostics, minimizing medical mistakes, standardizing medical processes, boosting resource administration, and reducing medical services redundancy (Bhati et al., 2023). EHRs increase communication in emergency care by promoting patient and interdisciplinary team participation, shortening wait times, and enhancing response times. For instance, deploying EHR is beneficial in emergencies where patients may have limited time. The EHR saves time by decreasing manual processing and pre-assessments (Vos et al., 2020). Advanced EHR assists in improving the standard of care given at Cleveland Clinic by enhancing patient outcomes.

Preliminary Goals for Improvement

1. Avoiding pre-assessment and premedical checkups will minimize patient waiting time, and patient safety will be ensured in emergencies at Cleveland Clinic. 
2. Medication reconciliation will be improved during patient care (Bhati et al., 2023).
3. Patient experience and satisfaction will be improved towards care services provided.
4. The Leapfrog and Medicare Compare Score Grade will increase for Cleveland Clinic.
5. Improve communication between doctors and patients using advanced EHR patient interfaces (Vos et al., 2020).

SAFER Guides Findings Related to Well-Performing Areas

Considering the SAFER Guide while evaluating advanced EHR performance at Cleveland Clinic is critical. SAFER Guides offer suggestions on how to use new technology in three major categories. The three categories are fundamental, infrastructure, and clinical process guidelines (Health IT, 2023). The EHR was reviewed for all nine safety criteria, and it was discovered that five are affected by this implementation. These factors are selected from the three major groups. In the context of SAFER Guides, advanced EHR performs effectively in Cleveland clinical settings regarding patient verification, clinical decision support, system configuration, contingency planning, and practitioner communication. In patient identification, the updated EHR facilitates and employs defined protocols for communicating information with other systems.

It has interfaces that facilitate medical vocabularies (Salmasian et al., 2020). During care, the Cleveland Clinic checks patient identity and information accuracy. For example, EHR supplied historical information about patients linked to their names, such as current medical history, recommended medicine, and laboratory results. This strengthens patient identification in emergency care settings before administering drugs or making suggestions. Regarding contingency planning, this data also assists in developing new treatments and medical plans for the unique patient’s vulnerability to chronic care in emergency rooms (Salmasian et al., 2020).

NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

In Clinical Decision Support (CDS), the Cleveland Clinic employs EHR for clinical assistance to execute activities consistent with the SAFER Guidelines. It entails dashboards for performance, medical notifications, data documentation, research-based prescriptions, and medication interactions. The Clinic’s EHR uses dashboards to track and deliver input on medical efficiency and patient care outcomes. Medical professionals use templates for recording patient information to make educated medical choices.

For example, through EHR, therapeutic reminders are provided for medication and medical history during emergency care, reducing medical errors (Feldman et al., 2021). EHR allows medical personnel to make precise healthcare decisions. Clinicians employ order sets consistent with recent medical evidence, enabling them to standardize care procedures in medical settings. Medical providers use EHR systems to monitor patients’ allergies and drug interactions during emergency care. The Cleveland Clinic is aligned with the system configuration point of the SAFER guide. EHR configuration reduces administrative constraints while increasing clinician productivity (Enahoro et al., 2024).

NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

 For example, EHR includes data restoration and backup, updates to software, and accessibility controls. Adequate backup and retrieval methods have been put to provide a continuum of service and avoid losing information. The EHR is frequently updated to keep it secure against threats. Robust restrictions on access, including authentication, are established to guarantee that only authorized people can access medical data (Nowrozy et al., 2024). The Cleveland Clinic employs EHR to improve clinician communication.

Standardized communication channels, encrypted messaging systems, and spoken order documentation are examples of SAFER Guide-compliant procedures. For example, implementing EHR-standard channels and user-friendly layouts promotes rapid and effective communication among medical personnel, enhancing service delivery and reducing errors (Vos et al., 2020). EHR supports encrypted texting, allowing staff to communicate privately and safely. To minimize misconceptions due to disseminating erroneous data, practitioners document spoken instructions using EHR. The EHR assists the Cleveland Clinic in offering efficient care (Anhalt et al., 2022).

SAFER Guides Findings on the EHR Associate Risks

The SAFER guide assists Cleveland Clinic in evaluating the advanced EHR system. The most important categories for implementing an upgraded EHR system are high-priority procedures, system setup, laboratory findings reporting and follow-up, patient identification, and organizational responsibilities regarding privacy (Health IT, 2023). EHR systems depend on the hardware and software, and system failure can result in interruptions in healthcare services. The SAFER guidance finding suggests that the EHR software may crash, causing delays in accessing medical data and influencing medical decisions. To mitigate this risk, deploying high-priority and efficient practices is critical. The category of high-priority practices emphasizes incorporating vital safety measures in the most recent EHR system.

For example, the Cleveland Clinic underscores pharmaceutical safety as a high-priority practice. Integrating Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE) systems and decision assistance in EHR reduces medical mistakes and improves medical decisions (Cerqueira et al., 2021). The second category is the system’s configuration, optimizing the EHR tool to ensure secure and effective processes. Inadequately structured workflows in the EHR can raise the likelihood of medical mistakes and missing records. The Cleveland Clinic has optimized the EHR system for better patient recognition. For example, by employing features like barcode scanning in EHR, the facility ensures correct drug recognition, lowering the possibility of errors (Pruitt et al., 2023). 

NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

The test outcome reporting and follow-up area focuses on developing systems for rapid and precise test outcome reporting and maintaining proper follow-up activities. Another danger identified by the SAFER guide associated with using the EHR is the possibility of delayed test findings (Health IT, 2023). Personnel variables can also add to the danger. The Cleveland Clinic has initiated optimizing this procedure by documenting test findings in the EHR tool. For instance, including test findings in an EHR can eliminate conventional entry requirements. The improved technology boosts Cleveland Clinic’s productivity and reduces the likelihood of mistakes caused by manual data transmission (Vos et al., 2020).

EHR tools keep personal medical data online, susceptible to data theft and hacking that can lead to ethical difficulties. For example, the Cleveland Clinic focuses on security and confidentiality by adopting a data encrypting platform and conducting periodic safety audits to safeguard patient medical data in the EHR system (Nowrozy et al., 2024). These safeguards help to protect medical information, reduce the danger of unwanted access or violations, and maintain patient confidentiality. The Cleveland Clinic increases patient safety, precision of data, and system stability by mitigating risks for improved EHR in three SAFER domains (Nowrozy et al., 2024). 

Experience of Using SAFER Guides

SAFER Guides are critical for recognizing and minimizing the hazards related to EHR use in Cleveland Clinic settings. Conducting self-evaluation, recognizing points of risk or threats, and prioritizing improving high-risk aspects are all steps in my approach to identifying risk areas and prioritizing improvement initiatives. As a nurse, I learned to apply the SAFER Guide to assess each new practice and related risk. I contend that it was the most effective method for identifying possible hazards associated with organizational duties in any medical facility. Recognition of risk using the SAFER Guide is also critical since it opens up new possibilities for enhancing deployment.

The experience with the SAFER Guides promotes collaboration and interprofessional teamwork. The evaluation and enhancement process frequently requires collaboration with staff such as IT experts, executives, and medical professionals from other disciplines. The cooperative strategy promotes efficient interaction, collaborative decision-making, and an awareness of the EHR system’s contribution to patient outcomes.  I intend to employ this tool in my future nursing positions at other healthcare institutions. Because technology, such as EHR, is incorporated into all medical settings, it is clear that the risks must be mitigated by utilizing the SAFER Guidelines.  

Conclusion

To summarize, Cleveland Clinic has recommended integrating advanced EHR with the current system for better treatment practices. EHR system is effective in shortening process times and boosting the Cleveland Clinic’s leapfrog score. SAFER Guides efficiently recognize risks in various parts of Cleveland Clinic that can be leveraged to promote advancements.

References

Adeniyi, A. O., Arowoogun, J. O., Chidi, R., Okolo, C. A., & Babawarun, O. (2024). The impact of electronic health records on patient care and outcomes: A comprehensive review. World Journal of Advanced Research and Reviews, 21(2), 1446-1455. https://doi.org/10.30574/wjarr.2024.21.2.0592

Anhalt, S., Wickenhauser, K. A., Lusk, K., Lehmann, C. U., McCormack, J. L., & Feterik, K. (2022). Direct secure messaging in practice—recommendations for improvements. Applied Clinical Informatics, 13(03), 767-773. https://doi.org/10.1055/s-0042-1753540

Bhati, D., Deogade, M. S., & Kanyal, D. (2023). Improving patient outcomes through effective hospital administration: A comprehensive review. Cureus, 15(10), e47731. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.47731

Cerqueira, O., Gill, M., Swar, B., Prentice, K. A., Gwin, S., & Beasley, B. W. (2021). The effectiveness of interruptive prescribing alerts in ambulatory CPOE to change prescriber behaviour & improve safety. British Medical Journa Quality & Safety, 30(12), 1038-1046. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjqs-2020-012283

Enahoro, Q. E., Ogugua, J. O., Anyanwu, E. C., Akomolafe, O., Odilibe, I. P., & Daraojimba, A. I. (2024). The impact of electronic health records on healthcare delivery and patient outcomes: A review. World Journal of Advanced Research and Reviews, 21(02), 451–460. https://doi.org/10.30574/wjarr.2024.21.2.0478

NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

Feldman, J., Szerencsy, A., Mann, D., Austrian, J., Kothari, U., Heo, H., & Testa, P. (2021). Giving your electronic health record a checkup after COVID-19: A practical framework for reviewing clinical decision support in light of the telemedicine expansion. Journal of Medical Internet Research Medical Informatics, 9(1), e21712. https://doi.org/10.2196/21712

Health IT. (2023). SAFER Guides | HealthIT.gov. Healthit.gov. https://www.healthit.gov/topic/safety/safer-guides

Nowrozy, R., Ahmed, K., Kayes, A. S. M., Wang, H., & McIntosh, T. R. (2024). Privacy preservation of electronic health records in the modern era: A systematic survey. ACM Computing Surveys, 56(8), 1-37. https://doi.org/10.1145/3653297

Pruitt, Z. M., Kazi, S., Weir, C., Taft, T., Busog, D. N., Ratwani, R., & Hettinger, A. Z. (2023). A systematic review of quantitative methods for evaluating electronic medication administration record and bar-coded medication administration usability. Applied Clinical Informatics, 14(01), 185-198. https://doi.org/10.1055/s-0043-1761435

Salmasian, H., Blanchfield, B. B., Joyce, K., Centeio, K., Schiff, G. B., Wright, A., & Landman, A. B. (2020). Association of display of patient photographs in the electronic health record with wrong-patient order entry errors. JAMA Network Open, 3(11), e2019652-e2019652. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.19652

NURS FPX 8012 Assessment 3 SAFER Guides and Evaluating Technology Usage

Vos, J. F., Boonstra, A., Kooistra, A., Seelen, M. A., & Van Offenbeek, M. (2020). The influence of electronic health record use on collaboration among medical specialties. BioMed Central Health Services Research, 20(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-020-05542-6