Dr. R. Dirk Stanley, director of health information at UConn Health, a five-hospital health system based in Farmington, Connecticut, is not the only clinician to complain of problems in working process. But he was one that was doing something about it.
As CMIO, Stanley and his team have redesigned UConn’s clinical workflow to better serve clinicians and their patients. And they’ve worked to reimagine electronic health records, while implementing artificial intelligence and automation to ensure critical IT best supports those new workflows.
We interviewed Stanley to understand the key issues with clinical workflow as he looked at them. He offers his advice on clinical workflow design and views on how AI and automation can help streamline efficiency and improve the supplier experience.
Q. What are the problems with today’s clinical workflow? And what role does IT health play?
ONE. The biggest challenge is that clinical workflows are complex, require great attention to detail, and are often interdependent on the who, what, when, where, and why of public processes. another thing. So getting it right often takes more time and effort than most people plan.
Fortunately, the national health IT community is responding by increasing support for applied clinical informatics and recognizing the importance of these “clinical architects” working with frontline clinical staff and other billing and HIM stakeholders to design best practice and secure employee and buy-in before configuring or building begins.
Q. What is your personal view of clinical workflow design? Where does one start? What are the best methods?
ONE. Good design starts with good design (#Blueprints BeforeBuild), so it takes clinical architects (applied clinical informatics) to really understand the current state and needs of all stakeholders, then design a solid, efficient, and user-friendly workflow for the future. meet all the clinical, legal and financial needs of the organization.
It begins with understanding the current state and learning how to quickly document it so that the elegant future state becomes clear and tangible, even before it is built.
Q. How do you make healthcare information technology like EHRs and AI relevant to the workflow design you create?
ONE. Workflow drives everything, so I always start with workflow. Once I know the workflow in its current and future state, I know the tools needed to support it both inside and outside of the EHR. This is a common source of confusion, thinking it’s just about tools inside the EHR.
Tools outside of the EHR are equally important, so it’s important to keep them all aligned and guide them all for good patient care. AI is a new evolution that fits perfectly with the general analytics and change management models I use to test technology and develop solutions, so AI just becomes another “role”. in my workflows and lane style diagrams.
Q. Please give an example of a bit of clinical workflow design you’ve done at UConn Health and how it has helped clinicians. What is the result of your work?
ONE. At UConn Health, I’ve helped streamline workflow across the organization, from our ED to the ICU and other inpatient areas, to surgical areas and emergency clinics. Intake, rounding, discharge, visits, pre-procedure, post-procedure – I work on it all, using my blueprint to translate end-user needs into specific products, so they can envision and agree on the future state before we start to build it. It is very satisfying work.
Some of my favorites are complex, high-risk workflows. With a previous company, I rationalized the titration of unfractionated heparin, completely from scratch. It has to be said at least that unfractionated heparin titration is a very complex workflow, so I am pleased that it has been developed, implemented, and adopted across the health system as a method. best practice.
Ultimately, this design work (clinical informatics) reduces clicks, reduces frustration, reduces variation, improves safety, and improves patient care.
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Healthcare IT News is a publication of HIMSS Media.
