Tag: patient health care

Healthcare and the Use of Modern Technology

In today’s time, doctors, nurses, hospitals and other public health officials are encouraging all patients to track their medical data by the use of modern technology. It is not a surprise that technology is one of the best tools to prevent diseases and other chronic illnesses. Medical professionals are very eager to know if patients can manage their health all by their selves by using all available modern devices and data.

In most advanced countries such as in the United States, their government is promoting online health programs which allow Americans to access their own medical records. These programs can be used by citizens to help them manage their health. Physicians and other health professionals can also use the online program to locate and connect with their patients. They can easily interact and give health advices to patients thru live chat and e-mails.

Fortunately, there are a lot of mobile applications related to health. These applications have the ability to help physicians closely monitor the health progress of their patients since there are portions in the application wherein patients can encode their daily meal intake and exercise being done.

Modern technology can also lessen healthcare costs. Recent studies show that patients who are using technology related to health have lessen their healthcare costs and have shown better and improved health. Most facts, blog articles and other data from online health programs and applications are well-researched and true. It can help patients with everything such as identifying correct drugs for certain minor diseases.

However, there can be instances wherein some mobile applications are not authentic. That is why health organizations around the world have warned patients to be extra careful in using applications and data since some of them don’t provide appropriate health facts and data.

Before using all modern devices and gadgets, it is better to visit and consult a healthcare provider personally. By doing it, physicians have the chance to assess patients internally and physically.

Improving Patient Care

According to the DEA, it is now legal to deliver medications for controlled substances digitally.  By following DEA requirements for EPCS, physicians have the option to digitally sign and deliver electronic prescriptions for controlled substances to certified drug stores.  While some suppliers still may not be fully aware of this new ability, others are enjoying the advantages. The obvious advantages associated with EPCS adopting include enhancing work-flow, creating complete EHRs, removing the prospective for stolen or changed prescription blanks, decreasing drugstore callbacks on illegibility, avoiding “pharmacy shopping,” and increasing overall individual safety and patient care. These factors, along with the problem of fighting the prescribed drug addiction plague in the United States, will likely be the power in extensive EPCS adoption.  While these features will take center stage, it’s important not to ignore the impact that this new form of controlled substance prescribing will have on patient care.

Many physicians and pharmacy technician already understand the severity of this new prescription ability in enhancing individual well-being.  At a time when Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and patient quality reporting dominate medical care headlines, there is no question that the move towards a patient-centered medical care model is in full swing.

In states where EPCS for Schedule II medicines is legal, experts who are dedicated to psychiatry, pain management, or emergency medicine will likely develop a unique admiration for this new technology. When one views the regularity with which pain management physicians and psychiatrists recommend Schedule II medicines, the amount is impressive.  Medications like Adderall, Oxycontin, Ritalin, and Morphine receive a lot of negative press because of their potential for misuse and diversion, but what many don’t realize is that there is a very large market with genuine medical need that require these medicines to go about everyday living. The Controlled Substance Act (CSA) requires, with very limited exemption, that Schedule II medications be written on original prescription forms from the specialist.  These medications must be sent to the drugstore, are not refillable and may not be called in or faxed.  While significantly decreasing the possibility for disruption, these conditions make significant difficulties for sufferers who regularly fill these medications.

Quality of Patient Care

People check out the healthcare center for a variety of ailments; some minimal, some serious, and some life-threatening. Whether you are getting stitching for a small cut or going through a major surgery treatment, the anticipations of every individual are generally the same; that you will get qualified and sympathetic patient care when you visit the healthcare center in a time of need. But what happens when physicians are tired or sick themselves? Nurses’ work is not easy. Especially in healthcare center configurations, many nurses must deal with the perceptive suffering and stressful actual requirements of a 12-hour work-day. As a result of working in such an extreme and challenging atmosphere, the healthcare staff often experience accidents themselves.

The American Journal of Nursing shows that 75 % of the healthcare staff experience some level of actual pain from a muscle stress or stress while at work. In addition, almost 20 % of the healthcare staff engaged in the study had warning signs of depressive disorders. According to the American Journal of Nursing, the quality of patient care does, in fact, reduce when the medical staff is tired. Scientists discovered that the risks of a patient fall such as prescription mistakes and mistakes including sedation or discomfort drugs, increased by about 20 percent when a health professional was in discomfort or suffering from depression.

The significance of these conclusions should not be taken gently. Medication mistakes created by physicians or the medical staff can have risky repercussions for sufferers and may result in serious injury or loss of life. Adding to the problem, nurse-to-patient employment percentages are not always consistent in medical centers. Because of this, the medical staff can find themselves in potentially risky situation of looking after for more sufferers than what is comfortable. The outcome is that sufferers may receive insufficient or inadequate treatment. Unfortunately, when avoidable mistakes occur because our caretakers are tired, harmed, or over-worked, sufferers are the ones who suffer the most.

Goal Oriented Patient Care

The largest U.S. health insurance provider, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), has set a multiple aim: better care for patients, better health for communities, and lower costs. At the same time, major efforts have been released to make healthcare more patient-centered, defined as “respectful of and aware of individual patient choices, needs, and principles, and ensuring that individual principles guide all clinical choices.”Attention to patient-centered actions and results will be particularly important as CMS moves increasingly to link medical healthcare providers’ compensation to their performance on selected actions.

 

So far, tests of quality of patient care and wellness results have not incorporated patient-centeredness. Rather, amount of quality has resolved preventive and disease-specific wellness care processes (e.g., smoking-cessation guidance and start of appropriate medications after myocardial infarction). Similarly, results measurement has focused on condition-specific signs, both short-term (e.g., glycated hemoglobin levels and high blood pressure control) and longer-term (e.g., disease-free survival), as well as overall death rate.

Though these process and results measures work well for relatively healthy sufferers with single illnesses, they may be unsuitable for sufferers with several circumstances, serious impairment, or short life expectancy. For such sufferers, the overall quality of health care is determined by more than just disease-specific health care procedures. Furthermore, disease-specific results may not effectively indicate treatment effects in sufferers with several coexisting illnesses. Adopting of more worldwide results, such as efficient position, would not ensure patient-centeredness unless they were regarded within the perspective of individual patients’ objectives and choices in the face of trade-offs.

Perhaps the most important hurdle to goal-oriented patient care is that remedies are greatly based in a disease-outcome–based model. Rather than asking what sufferers want, the culture has respected handling each condition as well as possible according to recommendations and inhabitants’ goals.

Ultimately, good remedies are about doing right for the affected person. For sufferers with several serious illnesses, serious impairment, or limited life expectancy, any bookkeeping of how well we’re following in providing health care must above all consider patients’ recommended results.