Professional, Ethical, and Regulatory Standards That Must Be Incorporated Into the Design and Implementation of the System

Professional, Ethical, and Regulatory Standards That Must Be Incorporated Into the Design and Implementation of the System

The Systems and Staff Members that Would Need to Be Involved in the Design and Implementation Process and Team

Implementation of the EHR will entail handling a wide range of medical information across various medical settings. Therefore, it will be important to incorporate a range of systems that will convert the information in real-time and upon request. Systems that will be required in the EHR include Documentation system, Billing and reimbursement system, E-prescribing, and Report generation systems. The documentation system will facilitate electronic charting and enable information to be well-structured and easily accessible to practitioners and patients (Aguirre et al., 2019). The billing and reimbursement system will facilitate easy payment of health services and ease reimbursement with insurance companies. The E-prescribing system will help track prescribed medications, evaluate medications for allergies, side effects, and interactions, and enable clinicians to make quick decisions regarding patients’ medication (Aguirre et al., 2019). Furthermore, the report generation system will enable providers to develop reports using specific information like demographics, medication, and procedures.

The EHR team will be sourced from key internal stakeholders and external consultants. The team will be composed of a project manager, application analyst, application developer, QA Test Engineer, physician, nurse, billing advocate, and super-users. The project manager will be the team leader and will be responsible for keeping the team focused on the project and timelines and will address user issues (Aguirre et al., 2019). The application analyst will be responsible for data migration and cleansing, while the application developer will be tasked with system customization. The QA Test Engineer will be responsible for system testing and performance. The physician, nurse, and billing advocates will represent physicians, nurses, and billing departments, respectively, and advise on training, data, and testing (Aguirre et al., 2019). Lastly, the super-users will be the early adopters for the EHR implementation training programs.

Professional, Ethical, and Regulatory Standards That Must Be Incorporated Into the Design and Implementation of the System

Professional standards that must be incorporated in the EHR design and implementation include completing a risk analysis of the system, encrypting electronic health information, and obtaining a HIPAA-compliant business associate agreement. According to Lee (2017), system users must be advised to report when data breaches occur immediately. Ethical standards must be incorporated by ensuring that patient health information is protected, including billing information, claims processing, enrollment status, diagnostic notes, and clinic visit notes (Lee, 2017). Ethical standards that must be incorporated in the implementation include adhering to patient confidentiality laws such as the Directory information rule, Treating physician rule. Social media rule and Business Associate Agreement rule. Regulatory standards must be integrated by complying with the HIPAA and HITECH regulations (Lee, 2017). The design and implementation team will ensure that HIPAA and HITECH regulations are followed during EHR software development, including its design, programming, and distribution.

How the EHR Team Would Ensure That All Order Sets Are Part of the New Record

Order sets refer to a group of orders that standardize and accelerate the ordering process for a specific clinical case. Order sets that are standardized and up-to-date facilitate the application of clinical decision support (CDS) at the point of care (Yang, Kang & Lee, 2016). The EHR team can ensure that all order sets are part of the new record using small groups of clinicians with multidisciplinary representation to curate order sets based on clinical guidelines, organizational policies, and expert opinion (Yang et al., 2016). The group should be tasked with approving, reviewing, and maintaining Clinical Ordered Sets in the new EHR. The EHR team can also create a clinical content strategy containing the best clinical practices and the organization’s standards with data content sources (Yang et al., 2016). Furthermore, the EHR team can develop a process that identifies and replaces obsolete content in the order sets that have potential adverse effects on patient safety and patient care quality.

Communication of the Changes, Including Any Kind of Transition Plan

Communication to the rest of the staff about the new EHR would be made through super-users and internal memos. The super-users will be provided in-depth training on all aspects of the EHR system to enable them readily understand and answer questi