Systems Development Life Cycle The Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) consists of phases used in developing a piece of software. It is the plan of how to develop and maintain software, and when necessary, replace that software. In 2007 during my hospital’s transition to a new software system, I was fortunate enough to be included in the process. I did not get involved until the implementation phase, but from then on, until now, I remain very active in the process. I decided to highlight the Waterfall Model of SDLC. The Waterfall Model is a “sequential development process” with each phase continuing in a line (McGonigle and Mastrian, 2012, p. 205). Feasibility The first stage in the SDLC is feasibility. The upper echelon of leadership usually decides if they want or need to pursue this software. An initial budget is determined in this phase. Governmental obligations, legal issues, and cost benefit are discussed here. I believe that the Chief Nursing Officer (CNO) should be involved here to help understand the implications to the hospital. Hopefully the health care setting has Nursing Informatics (NI) in their institution and is aware of upcoming governmental mandates. Financial penalties or loss of income could be involved if the hospital is not in compliance with software. Analysis Analysis consists of compiling data that consists of who is going to use the system, what data will be needed to be put into the system, what data will be needed out of the system, and what it needs to do for the institution. In my hospital at this step, our Information Technology (IT) department and some middle management were involved along with NI. Nursing should be more involved here since they are going to be the primary users.... ... middle of paper ... ...aving input. While we were doing our training sessions, certain parts of our system were still being assembled. It was beneficial to be able to tell nurses with concerns or ideas that we could still address and change the system before it was officially rolled out and we went “Live”. We still have updates and changes all the time. We are learning and improving with ideas coming from our nurses and firsthand experience. Having this ability seems to create satisfaction and ownership that I do not think we would have with it. References Congdon, K. (2011, March 25). The role of nurses in successful HIT deployments. Retrieved from http://www.healthitoutcomes.com/doc/role-of-nurses-in-successful-hit-deployments-0001 Hsiao, J., Chang, H., & Chen, R. (2011). A study of factors affecting acceptance of hospital information systems: A nursing perspective. Journal of Nur
Studies by Jha et al. examined surveys completed by the 2010 American Hospital Association Annual Information Technology of 2902 hospitals’ readiness for Meanin...
This nurse believes that if the appropriate monitoring of safety and security is implemented to protect confidentiality and quality of care that information technology (IT) in healthcare with continue to have a positive impact on patient care and outcomes. This nurse also believes that proper extensive training on these sophisticated systems is very important to patient safety and efficiency of care. With all the new advances in healthcare emerging it will be challenging but can only get better.
In the late 1960s, the first computer systems were installed in hospitals (Murphy,2010). The computer systems started in the basements of hospitals and now are in every nursing unit. Nursing informatics allows for a more efficient and faster delivery of health care. Nursing informatics is a way of keeping patient information properly organized and creating patient care plans.
The first reason that these matters are important in using information technology in nursing is the presence of established legal guidelines how to improve the quality of patients’ care while keeping clients’ personal information confidential and protected. Furthermore, the legislation significantly affecting several aspects of healthcare system, such as the dissemination of information, protection of personal information, use of technical standards, and use of electronic signatures (Hebda,2013). Utilization of informatics within healthcare system implies the easier process of sharing information, decrease amount of
We as nurses rely on technology, but we also have been taught to beware technology from making judgments for our nursing car. We know that technology can be wrong or mess up just like a human; therefore, we must always be knowledgeable and question our practice, to ensure safe nursing. Technology has pros and cons just like the human person does. “Storing clinical data, translating clinical data into information, linking clinical data and domain knowledge, and aggregating clinical data” is a helpful and time saving use of technology (Yoder-Wise, 2015). However, technology sometimes take precious time away; for example, a study found that “nurses spend up to 40% of their workday meeting ever-increasing demands from the systems in which they work” (Yoder-Wise, 2015). Technology also brings up an “ethical dilemma” as to when and how to use “extraordinary means to prolong life for patients with limited or no decision making capabilities” (Yoder-Wise, 2015). When is technology prolonging pain and hindering a peaceful natural death. Other issues like, “safeguarding patient’s welfare, privacy, and confidentiality” have been called into question with use of patient information in the computer systems (Yoder-Wise, 2015). There has to be safety parameter to protect patients according to HIPPA law, for example firewalls (Yoder-Wise, 2015). However, computerized patient information has also been a live saver and time saver because “provider order entry” is more clearly written,
Nurses play an important role in the sharing of patient information between doctors and the patients or other caregivers. Hence, they will inform the IT expert on key components that may arise with in the system.
Nurses should bear the responsibility of facilitating proper exchange and integration of the health records from different sources to facilitate the objectivity success of putting the system into meaningful use. Far from that, nurses will play an important role in the adoption of the new health technology by conducting further research on the possible ways of improving the system. Obviously, the adoption of the system will have implementation challenges that will be addressed through research practices. Moreover, nurses should explore further capabilities that can be brought forth by the new electronic health record system to ensure exhaustive exploitation of the system (Janssen, 2011). The basic requirement that will facilitate the achievement of success in the implementation of the new health record system will be allowing for free sharing of health records and information in different health set ups.
Marion Ball is a Professor Emerita at Johns Hopkins University and Senior Advisor in Healthcare Informatics at IBM. According to Dr. Ball, nursing informatics is “where technology and caring meet” (2011, p.13). Ball (2011) stated that nurses must “harness their ‘caring’ passion to the use of technology and informatics” thus “improving the quality and safety of the care they provide” (p.5). Dr. Ball’s background is not in nursing, but medical education. She began her career in a clinical laboratory as a programmer and served as liaison to the nursing department.
Sir, can you please step up to the glass, put your palm on the screen and follow the directions from the computer? This is where our future lies…in biometrics, computers, and science. Soon there will be no need to fill out tedious paperwork, to try to remember medications or past medical history. I know it exists in hospitals across America, I have seen it in action many times. Are we as nurses changing with the times? What is nursing informatics? Why is it important to me? How do I rate on the nursing informatics knowledge scale? What is my plan to increase my knowledge base? These questions should be at the forefront of every nurse’s thoughts. The information age has come crashing down on us from every possible angle in our lives, it affects how we communicate, how we educate, how we socialize and how we raise our children. Thus, why would nursing be immune to technology? These reasons alone should prompt each nurse to take inventory of their ability to effectively apply nursing informatics and utilize it for critical thinking and collaborative efforts when applying it to the nursing process. Each of us should be able to use technology to filter our pertinent information and collaborate with other professionals and apply this knowledge in our day to day patient care.
Given the time, it takes to develop large sophisticated software systems it not possible to define the problem and build the solution in a single step. Requirements will often change throughout a projects development, due to architectural constraints, customer’s needs or a greater understanding of the original problem. Iteration allows greater understanding of a project through successive refinements and addresses a projects highest risk items at every stage of its lifecycle. Ideally each iteration ends up with an executable release – this helps reduce a projects risk profile, allows greater customer feedback and help developers stay focused.
Software has become an integral component in the way organisations conduct business. The impact of and reliance on software within organisations is increasing (Pesola, Eskeli, Parvianeni, Kommeren & Gramza, 2008; Xu & Brinkkemper, 2007). Software development is becoming a global phenomenon as organisations have adopted networked development environments and have globally outsourced portions of their development activities (Valimaki & Kaariainen, 2008). According to Lacheiner and Ramler (2011) software development is a complex process as it requires interaction between diverse individuals, the creation of comprehensive software development documents and comprises interdependent activities. Kaariainen and Valimaki (2008) argue that as an outcome of increased competition, the ability to produce products as scheduled is important to any organisation. This has resulted in organisations investing in technologies and frameworks that manage and support their software development processes (Jwo, Hsu & Cheng, 2010). Application Lifecycle Management Technology (ALMT) is proposed as a solution for the management of software development activities.
LIST OF IMAGES Figure 1: Waterfall Model 7 Figure 2: Agile Model.8 Figure 3: Collaborative (Hybrid) Model.9 Figure 4: Model used by ACCA for Exam Entry project.14 1 Overview The Waterfall Model has been the ideal choice for software development. In this model, an idea becomes a usable software in a sequential process that cascades through the stages of Initiation, Analysis, Implementation, Testing and Maintenance. But it has some disadvantages. Agile software development evolved as a solution to the disadvantages of the Waterfall model. Instead of a sequential design process, the Agile methodology follows an incremental approach.
There are many sources of information out on the World Wide Web (WWW) regarding health care informatics groups. Sources that can, and will, be significant in the ever evolving area of technology in the health care setting. This paper looks at three informatics groups that have a large impact on informatics. Also, the specialty area of nursing informatics will be evaluated and will look at the future trends and challenges that may be encountered.
The Iterative development process was established due to the problems experienced with the Waterfall system process. In this case the project is divided into small manageable parts. Design results are available earlier in the process providing valuable feedback for the next process step. Once individual process steps are completed they can go into production immediately and not delayed till the last completed process as demonstrated in the waterfall model.
According to Blais and Hayes (2011) “New technologies, particularly information systems, are changing and improving nursing practice, education, research, and administration” (p. 290). However, although the use of technology and informatics can be very beneficial for nursing education and practice, nurses and student nurses have to be aware of the challenges of these technological changes to maintain nursing care quality. Currently, technologies and informatics are used in computerized patient records, evidence-based practice, or telehealth among other things. Moreover, “Several issues related to the increased use of technology in nursing include ethics, confidentiality, data integrity and caring” (Blais & Hayes, 2011, p.