The practice of Electronic Medical Records (EMRs) in healthcare has transformed the way patient information is collected, stored, and managed. EMRs are digital versions of paper charts, containing a patient's medical history, diagnoses, medications, treatment plans, immunization dates, allergies, lab results, and other pertinent clinical information. The healthcare industry has widely adopted EMRs due to their numerous advantages in improving patient care, operational efficiency, and overall healthcare delivery. Efficient Information Management: EMRs streamline the storage and retrieval of patient information. They eliminate the need for physical storage space required by paper records, making patient data easily accessible to authorized healthcare providers. EMRs allow for quick retrieval of patient information during consultations, reducing administrative time spent searching for records and enabling more efficient care delivery. Enhanced Coordination of Care: EMRs facilita...
“ Control and improvement are powers provided in an isolated way by the ticket management tools . However, achieving excellence in service is only feasible by combining both. " fashionglee
Previous recommendation, read:
• Ticket
management as a control tool
The improvement process
Volume 8 of ITIL defines the continuous improvement of the
service (CSI stands for Continual Service Improvement) and seeks to maintain
aligned IT services with the needs of the business in a changing environment by
identifying and implementing improvements in these services of you. In order to
manage this improvement, it is very important to have control over the
processes that you want to review . The continuous improvement of the service
has to be planned and planned like any other process, defining the activities,
inputs and outputs of the same, the roles and their functions, and presenting
status reports. The improvement process cycle is usually made up of seven
steps.
This approach helps us to understand the gap between current
and desired service management processes, according to the company's strategy.
It also sheds light on the initiatives to be carried out to shorten this gap.
The first point has to take into account what we want to be,
what is the vision . This vision has to be linked to the strategic vision of
the business . More than talking about alignment between IT and business, you
have to go a step further and get to talk about integration. To achieve this,
communication must be fluid, and expectations and priorities must be clearly
established.
Once it is known where we want to be, it is necessary to
check the current situation to see where we are starting from . We may not have
enough control over all services to be able to answer this question. It is
advisable, however, to try to select a series of more representative services
and mark a baseline with the information available . It is also necessary to
clarify the existing relationships with suppliers and the contracts signed with
them.
Along with the business, it is necessary to know where we
want to be . Functional and non-functional requirements must be correctly
defined. These must be documented and will be especially taken into account
when determining the SLAs . When talking about requirements, requirements
related to security, availability, reliability, response times and continuity must
be taken into account. It also has to be documented how these requirements are
to be monitored and measured.
Knowing the starting point and the destination point, you
can begin to think about the existing alternatives to travel that path. These
points must be taken into account throughout the life cycle of the development
of new services . In existing services, they will be taken into account for
their continuous improvement. It can be achieved by identifying and
implementing technological improvements, such as increasing redundancy for a
service that does not have the necessary availability according to the
definition of the business requirement.
Finally, it is necessary to know if the proposed objectives
have been achieved . The monitoring , measurement and reporting defined in the
requirements phase must provide the necessary and sufficient information to
answer the question “have we got there ?”. KPIs are the most important element
of this part of the improvement process.
The main roles that have to participate in the continuous
improvement of the service are:
• The
manager of continuous improvement of the service , who is in charge of managing
improvements in the processes and services of IT service management and in the
IT services themselves. It will continuously measure the performance of the
service provider and design improvements to processes, services and
infrastructure, in ways that increase efficiency, effectiveness and
profitability.
• The
process manager , who is responsible for planning and coordinating all the
activities of the process evaluation. Provides support to the parties involved
in the management and improvement of the processes, especially the process
owners. This role also coordinates changes to processes and ensures that all processes
cooperate perfectly.
• The owner
of the process , which corresponds to the role that ensures that a process is
fit for purpose. The functions of the process owner include sponsoring,
designing, and continually improving the process and its measurements. The
Process Owner is responsible for defining the process, assigning the necessary
roles to it, identifying the most relevant KPIs to know how it works and
ensuring its integration with the rest of the processes. Its continuous review
allows it to be improved.
It should be noted that the ticketing tools used must have
modules for generating reports from the information stored in each ticket , so
that this information can be used as a basis for the analyzes necessary to
complete the cycle of life of continuous process improvement.
Quick wins
The implementation of a service management model that
provides sufficient control and allows continuous improvement of processes
entails long-term projects since, as mentioned, it is not only a technological
project but also an organizational one .
However, to combat the resistance to change that a project
of these characteristics may provoke , and to be able to count on tangible
improvements in shorter stages, one or more of the following quick wins can be
implemented .