Nursing informatics essay

The health information system has a purpose of managing several dimensions within the healthcare facility stemming from financial, clinical and administrative concepts. Due to the wide range of benefits they express, several issues that surround the maintenance of an information system have been identified. One of the issues experienced with maintaining information system is confidentiality, this refers to accessing a patient’s information without consent. Breech of confidentiality could be intentionally or accidental, and in most cases intentional breech of patients’ data arises from negligence by the management. Typically, when data storage is not integrated with efficient security it becomes easy to access the information (Leila et al, 2017). Failure to integrate patient information is one problem faced in the maintenance of information system and as a result health information management team need to be sufficiently competent in their operation strategies (Salehinajad et al, 2014).

Nurses in healthcare should make integration of information one core concept in their routine management and care for patients. When information is not properly integrated hence quality of patient care is impaired The third problem experienced in the maintenance of information system is that the operational staff lack motivation and skills to effectively manage the information system. Often the hospital staff lack the motivation to collect data and feed them into the system as required, and as a result, the physician would lack sufficient information thus impairing their decision making capacity (Ahmadian et al, 2014) The process of data entry might be tedious especially in cases of insufficient staff, a number of hospitals have significantly higher number of patients and few nursing staff resulting to a ratio that is not workable.

Therefore, in most cases the nurses are overwhelmed and this results to negligence in such areas of data collection and entry. When patients report an institution for allowing easy access on their medical report, such institution would have a difficult time trying to gain the trust of other patients. As a result, they would sell negatively losing a number of clients resulting to financial losses. When an institution suffers from breech of data, a lot of information is lost (Salehinajad et al, 2014). Often it is not only the patients’ information that is accessed but some vital data concerning the operations of the hospital as well. The patients’ unique number would be lost and some of the hospital secrets would be accessed by competing firms which might be used to initiate failure of the institution.

Such organizations would hence register poor quality of patient care due to their incapacity to compile complete patient data (Lee, 2014). Continuous rise of such cases would then interfere with the number of clients seeking help from the hospital. When an institution does not get clients whom to attend, their financial capacity is diminished because of reduced flow of capital. Technicaly there would be no one to purchase the hospitals’ equipment such as drugs. Also, when the personnel employed to take part in data entry are not skilled enough, wrong results could be obtained such as information duplication and errors during entry all which would compromise quality of care. Effective data management would make it easier to access patient data and indicate referrals when necessary.

Physicians are also able to determine the various steps that the patient has undergone and be able to establish suitable management procedures. Assess The Role of the Informatics Nurse in Resolving these Issues The informatics nurse plays a vital role in resolving the issues that arise from maintenance of information system. Informatics nurses have a vital role of healthcare promotion and it is their obligation to prevent any obstacle that may hinder the process. Nurses need to be sufficiently competent in computer skills, as this would give them the capacity to employ computerized techniques in their patient care process (Asieh et al, 2014). Reference Asieh D. et al, (2014). “The Role of Nursing Informatics on Promoting Quality of Health Care and the Need for Appropriate Education” doi.