While other industries have been taking advantage of the power of Business Intelligence for the past two decades, healthcare has largely lagged behind. Recent KLAS research estimates that fewer than 100 U.S. hospital systems have enterprise data warehouses and sophisticated reporting tools at their disposal for use in clinical systems. Trending of public sentiment within the industry is clear. Based on financial incentives from the federal government, many healthcare organizations are currently focused on the implementation of electronic health records (EHR). They largely have not been focused on the implementation of more sophisticated systems like business intelligence.
Healthcare Organizations Change Focus to Business Intelligence
The tides are changing. In fact, 69% of respondents to the same KLAS research indicated that business intelligence will play a crucial role in their organizations in the near future. The reason? The same meaningful use requirements that currently fuel adoption of EHR also require an increasingly sophisticated use of data gathering and reporting. While the first stage of demonstrating meaningful use emphasized EHRs, later stages emphasize structuring codified data, exchanging data across hospital systems, and creating a patient-centric community care record.
Business intelligence will flow naturally from existing EHR investments. Once medical record data is collected through EHR systems, that data can be extracted, transformed, and analyzed using business intelligence tools. Clinicians and executives will then be enabled to transform healthcare delivery.
Data is an Untapped Asset for Healthcare Organizations
If leveraged correctly, business intelligence tools can yield measurable returns in terms of cost savings, staff productivity and enhanced diagnostic capabilities. Siloed stores of clinical data, which currently inhibit healthcare organizations, will be brought together to efficiently address the important needs of clinical care. Users at every level of the healthcare organization will be enabled by the power of dashboards, which provide an at-a-glance view of the most critical metrics. This is paired with the ability to dive deeper into that data to uncover the root cause of issues and correct them at their source. These dashboards are particularly well-suited to the frenetic pace of hospital systems where life-and-death decisions often need to be made within seconds.
Do you have any questions about business intelligence requirements and meaningful use? Let us know, and we’d be happy to help. We would also like to invite you to attend our April 21st webcast: Jump Start Your Healthcare Enterprise Analytics with Core Measures. We will demonstrate how top healthcare organizations are realizing the benefits of data analytics in such core areas as core measures, clinical alerting, surgical analytics, service line profitability, diabetes management, revenue cycle management, claims management and utilization. Register Today
