Healthcare Information And Management Systems Society: Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model

Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) is a global non -profit organization with the focus of bettering health through information and technology. HIMSS North America which includes America and Canada provides leadership, professional development, and public policies. The North America division has over 61,000 members and partners with over 400 other non-profit organizations. One way in which HIMSS helps improve health is through their Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model (EMRAM). The model was first proposed by HIMSS in 2006 and verifies digital capabilities. EMRAM drives organizations to a paperless environment and support technology to increase patient health. The model ranks facilities based on an eight-step scale,

According to HIMSS Analytics organizations who achieve stage seven status no longer use paper charts. Therefore, personal patient data diagnostic results and images and clinical information and all in an electronic medical record. Since paper charting is eliminated facilities have written disaster recovery plans and protocols which are schedule tested. All patient information is available and easily shared amount interdisciplinary healthcare teams both within the organization and outside the group. Inpatient documentation of physicians reaches or is above 90%. Stored accumulated data is used to analyze trends in facility data to improve quality of care and care delivery efficiency. In reference to, the HIMSS website a low percentage of hospitals in North America and Europe have reached stage seven status. Ayat, Sharifi, & Jahanbakhsh 2017, give the example that only one hospital in Spain has reached level seven and none in the Middle

Currently, hospital-wide in inpatient settings there is a goal achieve a medication scanning percentage of ninety-five percent or above. Medications are scanned on either portable care mobile machines or provided Cerner phones. Therefore, although the closed loop medication administration is entirely running, we do not meet ninety-five percent requirement for stage seven. Currently, to improve unit and staff scanning percentages, monthly reports are printed and given to management members. A warning system is in place in my unit, CPSU. First, is a verbal warning and next is a written warning. Having written warnings in a personal staff file can exclude a member from taking and applying for another internal position and from being moved up the clinical nursing ladder. Usually to achieve a new status a team member must be cleared of written warning in his/her file for six months. Besides having the warning system in place, I believe that implementing a reward plan would help individual units and ultimately the hospital achieves required percentages. Other reasons why I think Nash General is at phase six is because requirements such as technology integration with pharmacy and laboratory exist and advanced level of CDS such as VTE protocol recommendations are currently