Failures!

So what are some of the reasons that cause an Informatics initiative to fail? Over 50% of them fail or fail to meet expectations! If you have read all of my previous posts, you know some of them already, but let's summarize and re-examine some of those.

1. Lack of well defined measurements
For an informatics initiative to be successful, this, folks is number one. Talk with your internal and external customers. What do they need to see on a daily/weekly/monthly/quarterly/yearly basis? Understand how each measure is contributing to the well being of the organization.

2. Data Quality
When you bring data in, ensure quality. There are several industry standards that allow you to ensure this. A little extra time spent up front will help you make better decisions.

3. Lack of Sponsorship
You can build the coolest platform in the world, but no one will use it if there is no sponsorship from key executives in your organization. Even before you start, get the lines of business executives involved and "SELL" them the idea of informatics and how their organizations can benefit from efficient use of this technology.

4. Running parallel
You may think that breaking your informatics initiative into two tracks (ETL track and BI track) will save you time and money, but in reality, what comes into your warehouse might not be what the customer wants to see.

5. Tool/Vendor selection
Tools are tools. They don't produce information unless you tell them to! Without a well defined plan of execution, the coolest tools will sit there and collect dust. Get your IT folks involved early on. They have done the research and can guide you through the process.

Reforming Healthcare - "Creating Value"

I was just reading Mayo Clinic’s newsletter detailing Mayo’s point of view on healthcare reform. According to the point of view article, the Number “one” recommendation is Medicare Value Indexing or V=Q/C. Value = Quality/Cost and they give you some examples of “measuring” quality and I quote:

1. Quality (Q) — the numerator — includes clinical outcomes, safety and patient reported satisfaction.
Examples of outcome measures: hospital admissions, emergency department visits, readmission rates and mortality rates
Examples of safety measures: central line infection rates, medication errors and post-operative complications
Examples of patient satisfaction: National Research Corporation’s Healthcare Market Guide

2. Cost (C) — the denominator — encompasses the cost of care over time.

Sound familiar? Both these recommendations rely heavily on Informatics. Ability to measure outcomes, safety measures and patient satisfaction are all functions of an Informatics solution. The denominator, as explained in the article, ability to do trend analysis on cost is another function of a comprehensive informatics solution. The article goes on to recommend doing a value-based care “demonstration project”.

Now, not to brag, but our software, IATROMATIX, is a comprehensive platform that has quite a few of these capabilities built in. If you are interested in a presentation, please email me at kishore@metaanalytix.com