Needs Assessment Report: Integrating Telemedicine with EHR Systems

This report presents a needs assessment for the integration of telemedicine with Electronic Health Records (EHR). It outlines the importance of incorporating online technology to improve healthcare, especially for patients in remote areas. The assessment methodology includes questionnaires for healthcare staff and patients, along with web-based surveys and focus groups. The report identifies potential gaps in the integration, such as patient adaptability and vendor limitations. It also provides guidance for physicians on utilizing telemedicine, including the use of video conferencing, patient monitoring tools, and data encryption. Furthermore, the report discusses the benefits of EHR-telemedicine integration, such as improved data organization, chart availability, and better accessibility to progress notes. Finally, the report suggests that the Medical Record Department is the best department to manage the integrated system, ensuring proper documentation and access for both doctors and other healthcare professionals.

Running head: NEEDS ASSESSMENT
Telemedicine with EHR integration: Needs Assessment
Name of the student
Name of the University
Author note

1NEEDS ASSESSMENT
The current healthcare system can be revolutionized by the incorporation of online
technology. It is very important for all the healthcare facilities and hospitals to incorporate
those online systems, which can treat and monitor the patients who live in the remote areas.
Incorporating these systems to the EHR system is beneficial as it can improve the flow of
data the physicians receive (Blumenthal, & Tavenner, 2010). The American Telemedicine
Association described telemedicine as the exchange of medical information from one site to
another site through the electronic communication system to improve the clinical health of a
patient.
The way of conducting the needs assessment:
To conduct the needs assessment on EHR and telemedicine integration, two different
types of questionnaires would be in need, to know the gaps of implementing the integration
of telemedicine with EHR. One type of questionnaire would be for every healthcare staff
including the physicians, and nurses. Another type of questionnaire would be for the patients.
To address the gaps of the implementation of EHR and telemedicine, more or less 300
patients of the hospital are needed to be interviewed.
A web-based survey was also chosen for the patients who are already using the
system. Their care plan and the clinical records were already recorded in the EHR system.
These patients might be used as a focus group. They are perfect for providing the hospitals
with plans about how to better the system and how to make the system more user-friendly.
The hospital staffs would also provide some information about the betterment of the system
at their end.
One of the possible gaps of the EHR- Telemedicine integration is adoptability of the
patients with the new technology. The patients need to be trained to use the facility (Cifuentes

2NEEDS ASSESSMENT
et al., 2015). The problem can also happen from the vendor’s side as the vendor might limit
the usage of the application for the economic reasons.
The hospital staff is preoccupied with works most of the time. They might not find
enough time to see the queries posted by the patients and reply all. The limited data flow of
the hospital is also another problem for the staffs to use the tool.
Guidance to the physicians to define their end user needs:
The physicians must update their knowledge about implementing telemedicine to their
practice. For simulating the perfect face- to- face interaction, the doctors can use the
videoconferencing option, which enables them to connect directly to the patient. To improve
the user needs, the doctors must work as the originating site to connect the patient to other
physicians and service providers if needed (Davidson et al., 2013). The physicians also need
to know about all the relevant federal and state laws. The physicians can also use the patient
monitoring tools in order to check the patients suffering from chronic diseases (Palen et al.,
2012). The physicians will also have to include the patients and their families to use the tools
such as sphygmomanometer, glucometer and electronic scales. These tools can help the
physicians to manage the health patients in need. The physicians should also know how to
encrypt the data obtained from the patients in order to prevent a privacy breach while using a
integrated telemedicine- EHR.
Implementation of the integration of EHR and Telemedicine:
The hospitals using the EHR viewing capabilities has improved data organization,
chart availability and legibility. Treating the patients becomes easy for the physicians and the
nurses as they can see the chart and data (Nguyen, Bellucci, & Nguyen, 2014). The hospital
staffs also spend very little time in finding the data of any particular patient.

3NEEDS ASSESSMENT
The physicians using integrated telemedicine- EHR system has better accessibility of
the progress notes. The documentation templates used in the system are relatively advanced,
and improves the overall quality of care (Nguyen, Bellucci, & Nguyen, 2014). The doctors
can evaluate the appropriateness of the prescribed medicine through the service, as all the
documents are thoroughly available in the EHR system (Hersh et al., 2014).
The providers typically use the electronic messaging service, which improves the
overall availability, accuracy and timeline of the massages and increases the completeness of
the documentation. The implementation of the EHR- telemedicine systems improves the
overall quality treatment in the hospital.
Best department to manage the system:
The best department to manage the EHR- telemedicine integrated system in a hospital
is the Medical Record Department. They should have the overall access to the system to
arrange the documents properly according to the criteria set up by the hospital. The doctors
should also have the access to the EHR- Telemedicine integrated system, as it would help
them to document the prescriptions for both the in-house patients and also for the patients
contacting through phone or teleconference.

4NEEDS ASSESSMENT
Reference:
Blumenthal, D., & Tavenner, M. (2010). The “meaningful use” regulation for electronic
health records. N Engl J Med, 2010(363), 501-504.
Cifuentes, M., Davis, M., Fernald, D., Gunn, R., Dickinson, P., & Cohen, D. J. (2015).
Electronic health record challenges, workarounds, and solutions observed in practices
integrating behavioral health and primary care. The Journal of the American Board of
Family Medicine, 28(Supplement 1), S63-S72.
Davidson, E., Simpson, C. R., Demiris, G., Sheikh, A., & McKinstry, B. (2013). Integrating
telehealth care-generated data with the family practice electronic medical record:
qualitative exploration of the views of primary care staff. Interactive journal of
medical research, 2(2), 51.
Hersh, W. R., Gorman, P. N., Biagioli, F. E., Mohan, V., Gold, J. A., & Mejicano, G. C.
(2014). Beyond information retrieval and electronic health record use: competencies
in clinical informatics for medical education. Advances in medical education and
practice, 5, 205.
Nguyen, L., Bellucci, E., & Nguyen, L. T. (2014). Electronic health records implementation:
an evaluation of information system impact and contingency factors. International
journal of medical informatics, 83(11), 779-796.
Palen, T. E., Price, D., Shetterly, S., & Wallace, K. B. (2012). Comparing virtual consults to
traditional consults using an electronic health record: an observational case–control
study. BMC medical informatics and decision making, 12(1), 65.