Case Study 2 Analysis and Design Assignment

Case Study: Community Patient Portal System

Case Study: Community Patient Portal System

One of the strategies that have been adopted by various healthcare organizations is electronic health record system (Hoerbst & Ammenwerth, 2010). This strategy has brought a great impact in the provision of healthcare since patients can seek medical care without moving to the physical location of the healthcare organization.

1. The stakeholders for the community patient portal system

i) Health consumers-The patients are the major stakeholders of the online health portal since they are the people who will seek health services at the organization. The patients will be expected to register on the website as health consumers.

ii) Healthcare professionals-The doctors, as well as nurses, will be expected to provide healthcare services such as conducting laboratory tests and recording patients’ information and the putting the data online for the patients to access.

iii) Health insurance organizations- Health insurance organizations are also stakeholders since they will provide a variety of coverage for the patients who have registered in the online health portal.

iv) Federal government agencies- Relevant federal government agencies such as the Department of Human Services will have to evaluate if the online health portal has adhered to the regulations advocating for high-quality health services.

The Community Patient Group will be actively involved in the web portal through registering into the site and providing a relevant medical history as well as the various diseases or health conditions that patients are suffering from.

As the business grows another group of stakeholder who will be interested in the system functions will be health consumers who are in other locations or even other countries. This is because other patients who are not residents of the community will be able to access the information and thus develop an interest in seeking health services. Online operations will open up new markets for the Community health organization.

2. Specific analysis techniques to be used

i) The patient population to be covered by the online portal-The analysis must cover the population that the web portal will serve.

ii) The internet accessibility rate among the health consumers-The analysis will also examine the rate of which the patients have access to the internet.

iii) Resources available at the Community Patient Group-The analysis must evaluate if the health organization has sufficient resources to establish an effective online health portal.

Questions to be asked

a) Does the targeted patient group have access to computers and internet connection?

b) What is the targeted patient population?

c) Does the organization have sufficient resources that can facilitate the development of the web portal?

3. Technology and communication requirements

Several technology and communication devices will be needed to develop the online health portal. For example:

i) Personal computers- Computers will enable the establishment and management of the web portal

ii) Network servers- The website will have to possess servers and particular networks such as Local Area Network that will allow users to effectively access the website.

iii) Enterprise software systems- The community healthcare organization will also adopt advanced enterprise software systems that will enable smooth operations of the users and administrators (Munawar & Ward, 2006).

iv) Email systems- The organization will have to develop an email that will be used to pass information to the health consumers.

The computer hardware that I will recommend includes several monitors and CPU systems that will enable the feeding of patients’ data into the web portal. Other storage devices such as hard disks will also be used to store patient information as well as tests results.

4. Primary functional requirements for the system

i) Ability to create patients and doctors profile-The system will be expected to create profiles for both health providers and health consumers. This will improve the way the website will be used.

ii) Ability to store electronic health records- The system will also store large quantities of patients’ data electronically. The system should be able to develop a database that will store the data of various health consumers.

iii) Allow e-visits and interaction with the health professionals- The system should also facilitate the electronic visits that will be done by the patients. Moreover, it will allow effective interaction with the doctors and the patients through a convenient interface.

iv) Enable the health consumers to access health services- The system will also allow different health consumers to access information on various health issues and disorders. The patients will easily access and update information on their coverage as well as recovery status.

Non-functional requirements for the system

i) Effective response time- The system should have a quick and convenient response time that will allow health consumers to quickly access and feed information into the web portal.

ii) Reliability- According to Wakefield et. al., (2010), the web portal system should provide a reliable interface that can provide an effective opportunity for the health service providers and the health consumers to interact and monitor their operations.

iii) User satisfaction-The system will also provide users with services that will satisfy their needs and preferences. The system is expected to provide vital information that is critical to the patient hence satisfying their health needs.

iv) Ease of use-The system should also be easy to use since some of the health consumers may be senior citizens who may not efficiently operate the system. An easy to use interface will increase the number of health consumers visiting and registering on the web portal.

In summary, designing and developing a healthcare-based web portal requires the adoption of various strategies that are aimed at developing a user-friendly interface that healthcare professionals and easily interact with health consumers.

References

Hoerbst, A., & Ammenwerth, E. (2010). Electronic health records. Methods Info Med, 49(4), 320-336.

Munawar, M. A., & Ward, P. A. (2006). Adaptive monitoring in enterprise software systems. SysML, June.

Wakefield, D. S., Mehr, D., Keplinger, L., Canfield, S., Gopidi, R., Wakefield, B. J., & Kochendorfer, K. M. (2010). Issues and questions to consider in implementing secure electronic patient–provider web portal communications systems. International journal of medical informatics, 79(7), 469-477.