Assignment help – Discuss the risks and opportunities for sharing clinical data.
What types of personal health information (PHI) is covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of 1996. (HIPAA)? How can nurses protect electronic PHI?
Assignment help – Discuss three factors that impact the management of patient flow in hospitals.
What is telehealth? List three applications of telehealth. Share a link to where you found this information.
Identify sources of data for research. Provide an example.
What are three ways that privacy can be breached?
How will your nursing practice evolve and adapt as a result of the knowledge and skills you’ve acquired in this nursing informatics course?”
Interdisciplinary Collaboration: How will you collaborate with IT specialists, administrators, and other healthcare professionals to optimize healthcare processes and ensure the highest quality of care?
Sharing Clinical Data
There are both risks and opportunities associated with sharing clinical data more broadly. Key risks include potential privacy breaches if data is not properly de-identified. Strict protocols must be followed to remove any protected health information (PHI) that could identify individual patients. There are also ethical concerns if data is used without patient consent or for purposes other than direct care and quality improvement initiatives (Michelen, 2022).
However, wider sharing of clinical data enables large-scale research that can improve treatment options and health outcomes for many. Large datasets reveal insights not possible with smaller samples and can accelerate discovery of new therapies and disease patterns (Raghupathi, 2020). Appropriate data sharing allows clinicians to benchmark performance and identify best practices while better coordinating complex care needs (Dwivedi, 2021).
Telehealth Applications
Telehealth utilizes technology to deliver virtual medical, health, and education services (WHO, 2021). Major applications include telemedicine for diagnosis and care, remote patient monitoring to track ongoing health data, health education to empower patients in self-care, and provider training to expand expertise (Kruse, 2022). During the COVID-19 pandemic, telehealth usage surged dramatically for routine care as well as management of COVID-19 cases (Smith, 2020). Looking ahead, telehealth promises to increase access, convenience, and care quality while reducing costs across the healthcare ecosystem (Mahon, 2016).
Data Sources for Research
Nurses can utilize a wide variety of data sources for conducting research. Examples include electronic health records, insurance claims databases, disease or specialty registries, patient surveys, biometric devices, and government open data portals (Menachemi, 2011). In one nursing study, researchers analyzed hospital EHR data to assess post-discharge outcomes for elderly patients with heart failure (Rodriguez, 2022). Data must be carefully validated and protected to ensure privacy. But rich data sources enable nurses to pursue insightful, patient-centered research questions.
Interdisciplinary Collaboration
As a nurse informaticist, I will collaborate closely with information technology teams to optimize systems and data architecture to balance ease-of-use, accuracy, security, and meaningful analysis capabilities. Engaging end-users in the design process is crucial for successful adoption (Harrington, 2022). I also aim to partner with administrators and clinicians to understand workflows and identify the most impactful opportunities to leverage technology to improve safety, quality, and efficiency. Finally, cross-disciplinary communication with legal/compliance teams will help ensure we protect sensitive data while fostering a culture of information sharing focused on better patient outcomes.
