The Tech world is busy creating tools and software for the healthcare sector and the healthcare professional to enable them to provide better care and have more freedom and yes there is financial gain for the people creating the tools.
As you can imagine I, like many of you, have heard the term "Information at the point of care" a few times and it is a concept that we subscribe to at Clinic to Cloud with tools like the doctor mobile applications. There begs the question though of what information and how much information is needed at that point? as an example have look at POC-IT from one of the leading health organisations in the world, John Hopinks Medicine.
Where is this information flowing from and how should it be presented to the health care professional, are but some of the questions that we consider in our design. Yes we are focused on providing information at the point of care, however, We also need to capture information at that point which is a more contentious topic if you ask any HCP. Clinicians are often unhappy with that process as it can slow them down and take up too much time scribing as oppose to providing the actual care needed by the patient.
I have noticed in some markets a young intern or a nurse is provided to every consultant or VMO for that purpose alone, capturing data at the point of care.
What of the patient in those circumstances, are they entitled to information at the point of care? Capturing information themselves for their own record or simply receiving and scribing, assuming they are conscious or coherent of course. I understand some of the large software vendors have or are in the process of supplying smart devices to patients in-hospital as an example more as a resource and entertainment device at this point, However I see this developing into much more.
Other points of consideration are the security and privacy aspects of the information flow. Who owns the information, who is going to see it? Assuming those parameters are met then yes let it flow I say! After all we know that everyone is focus on the best outcome for the patient and the patient wants to do more regardless of demographic. See Prof Judith Hibbard 's work on this subject.
More sharing, more capturing, more thinking, more tools to efficiently allow that, would be my message and let's keep refining the tools together.
Rafic
