{"id":24753,"date":"2020-09-10T17:16:28","date_gmt":"2020-09-10T11:46:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fatbit.com\/fab\/?p=24753"},"modified":"2025-11-17T12:45:20","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T07:15:20","slug":"how-to-build-an-ehr-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fatbit.com\/fab\/how-to-build-an-ehr-system\/","title":{"rendered":"EHR Software Development: Adding Value to the Healthcare System"},"content":{"rendered":"

The role of power-packed miniaturized technology solutions in every field today has brought decisions at our finger-tips. With a few clicks and scrolls, one can access information boundlessly.<\/span><\/p>\n

The same has been thoughtfully crafted to serve healthcare needs. Technologists have worked their way to help build dependable healthcare, accessible even in difficult areas and times. Bill Gates has put this rightly:<\/span><\/p>\n

“By giving us comprehensive access to our personal health information, digital technology can make us all agents for change, capable of pushing for the one thing we all really care about: A medical system that focuses on our life long health and prioritizes prevention as much as it does treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Electronic health records or EHRs came into existence for similar reasons. A clear motive of creating a comprehensive health portfolio of the individual, accessible by both, the individual and the healthcare provider, EHRs contribute to a wholesome healthcare experience. All the more, they serve as rich data sources for those who plan healthcare accessibility, policies, development, and financial coverage.<\/span><\/p>\n

The development of an EHR itself, a very technical domain, has outcomes that are even more gainful.<\/span><\/p>\n

I plan to take you on a little expedition through the journey of the patient or member data to a sophisticated EHR. There can be multiple approaches to begin work towards software development for an EHR, a good one could however begin simply with a healthcare mobile app.<\/span><\/p>\n

A very common practice is to create a software, custom-designed as per the needs of those who will utilize the EHR every day. But a dynamic and progressive thought would add to it, a mobile application to enhance the patient experience and enable easy quality data collection.<\/span><\/p>\n

Why should healthcare mobile applications have a deeper motive?<\/b><\/h2>\n

Every application you carry on your phones\/tablets or systems seems to capture some essence of your life. For example, the food industry analysts study data from food apps to understand what the community spends on, and the fashion industry grabs the feel of what is trending.<\/span><\/p>\n

The same is the case with the plethora of applications that track fitness and health through various parameters. There is no doubt that their contribution to the improved behavior of their users across age-groups is significant.<\/span><\/p>\n

The real impact of this data capture and behavior understanding will matter only when the members can use all this in the long run for their health management.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is what forms the driving force behind community healthcare platforms. They serve the management of healthcare organizations as well as the government with rich and comprehensive electronic health records. This data source is used for advanced analytics and priceless insights that help them make informative and planned decisions towards improving healthcare.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, every healthcare application must entail this motive and contribute to this data pool to fill in the gaps for a better healthcare management.<\/span><\/p>\n

EMR & EHR – The sense and The Expanse – Differentiating the EMR & the EHR<\/b><\/h2>\n

The domain of healthcare is enriched with new terminologies every day. With so many integrations happening, creating a clear picture in your mind can help you understand what you want to build.<\/span><\/p>\n

Developing an electronic record system for any hospital or clinic brings you to a case where the developer must be sorted on the purpose. You could be trying to solve a problem for the organization, and yet end up developing something incomplete.<\/span><\/p>\n

An EMR (Electronic Medical Record) and EHR (Electronic Health Record) are very close in their rationales but quite different in their basic structure and connectivity.<\/span><\/p>\n

While an EMR is simply an electronic record of a patient created by one doctor for one practice or indication, the EHR is the complete health record of the patient for all the indications with a lot many other aspects also.<\/span><\/p>\n

The possibility of sharing information on a single patient between different HCPs (health care providers), enabling them to manage the patient from all health facets, is what makes an EHR worthy of development and integration within any healthcare system.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"1.If each of us had an opportunity to view all our health details, analysis of past and present vitals with reminders and short term goals planned, in a single application on our phones, how easy would managing health seem to be? An obvious answer for an attractive path to walk on.<\/span><\/p>\n

Multi-device integration<\/b><\/h2>\n

A thoughtfully developed EHR will enable access of all information to all authorized components of a healthcare ecosystem. But since not all conduct is possible over a mobile, a multi-device integration becomes imperative. Some features need action through a desktop and some through a self-service kiosk.<\/span><\/p>\n

The EHRs need to be developed such that the nurses, doctors, accounts, board, and the management, can all play their parts efficiently on their assigned devices.<\/span><\/p>\n

The multi-device integration feature also enables gathering data from different devices, applications, or fitness trackers used by the member. Many third-party integrations into the EHR application can enable collecting the data from multiple devices.<\/span><\/p>\n

This helps understand the patient better in terms of their lifestyle. The benefits of access to such a comprehensive profile need no description.<\/span><\/p>\n

Easy documentation<\/b><\/h2>\n

When everything is entered and stored inside a single file, it\u2019s tracking, updating, analyzing, and sharing automatically becomes a trouble-free activity. Lengthy documentation and maintenance of records can now be done with much ease. Plus, everyone who is a part of the healthcare delivery can contribute to the data-pool, enriching the overall experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

Standardized reporting<\/b><\/h2>\n

Every hospital\/clinic has its own style of collecting information. Some prefer history to be explanatory and some just require brief answers to questions in order to understand the causal relationships.<\/span><\/p>\n

The same information when traveling to different healthcare professionals undergoes evolution and ends up as a long record which seems difficult to comprehend.<\/span><\/p>\n

The EHR promises to sort this with maximal information flow through a uniform format. Everyone in the chain accessing it is able to draw key information quickly, saving time, and improving efforts.<\/span><\/p>\n

Secure health information exchange (HIE)<\/b><\/h2>\n

The purpose of an EHR is fulfilled only when different stakeholders within the cycle are able to play their parts of improving the system. Set standards while developing the EHR should be thus in-built.<\/span><\/p>\n

CCR (Continuity of Care Record) and CCD (Continuity of Care Document) certifications allow EHRs to connect to the HIE in their regions creating a holistic view of every patient\u2019s records. The HIE hence becomes a repository of patient data, pooled in from various centers in that area, accessible through secure and regulated channels.<\/span><\/p>\n

The EHRs developed in accordance with these regulations are thus able to enrich the HIE with priceless data.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"2.The Stakeholders – What does the EHR offer to the healthcare ecosystem?<\/b><\/p>\n

A stakeholder is one who benefits out of any development and integration. An EHR serves many across domains. There are primary, secondary, and tertiary stakeholders that draw information relevant to their businesses for immense value addition. Beginning with the patient and the caregivers to the insurance agents, employers, public authorities, and the healthcare industry as a whole, the EHR and the HIE system upscales every player.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"3.How would you suppose an EHR integration could help make millions of dollars?<\/b><\/p>\n

When a software installed into any organization improves efficiency, enhances satisfaction amongst those paying for your services, the proportionality is not a wrong assumption.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you top this with the priceless data-pool this software is able to generate for insights worth millions, there remains no doubt you have supplemented your system with an essential ingredient.<\/span><\/p>\n

Healthcare today is going exponentially virtual. <\/span>With the surge in telemedicine from 11% to a whopping 76% in 2019, the relevance of launching an EHR within a healthcare system was never more.<\/span><\/p>\n

The<\/span> analysts at<\/span> McKinsey predict a $250 billion of healthcare spending to be directed towards the virtual segment of it. But how did they reach this analysis? From where do they gather data for such trendsetting insights?<\/span><\/p>\n

When the McKinsey analysts report that 20% of all Medicare, Medicaid, and commercial expenditure divided across healthcare, work, and home fitness is going online, the insurance companies and the employers draft policies accordingly. They would pay anything to access this data for such analytical outcomes.<\/span><\/p>\n

The hospital management and board are able to create environments favoring this trend, modernizing healthcare all-the-more.<\/span><\/p>\n

As a result of an EHR software integration, the entire chain is augmented.<\/span><\/p>\n

EHR – Discovery, System Design & Development<\/b><\/h2>\n

Discovery towards an iterative & patient-centric design for an in-built care continuum<\/b><\/h3>\n

Understanding the pain points and the demand in defining user stories that fulfill the sole purpose for the EHR development is the most crucial of steps. The main questions that need to be answered are:<\/span><\/p>\n