Far too many organizations look at the EHR go live as the end all be all to EHR implementations. Unfortunately, this fallacy in thinking has caused many EHR implementations to suffer after the EHR go live. The reality of an EHR implementation is that it’s never done.
This was highlighted really well in this graphic that The Advisory Board Company put out about the EHR life cycle. They compare the EHR lifecycle to that of raising a child. The most poignant part of this chart to me are the final 3 phases of the EHR lifecycle which are all after the EHR go live event. These final 3 phases are listed as ongoing. In other words, these final 3 phases will never end.
See the details in the graphic below (click on it to see a larger version):
If you don’t have a process in place to improve your EHR use, performance, and the benefits you receive from your EHR, then you should get one now.
I was surprised to see this graphic only considers IT to be critical in 2 of the 7 stages (Build, Test & Train and Go Live). I’ll freely admit my bias as a member of IT, I think IT is critical in all stages since they will be the ones implementing and maintaining the EHR.
What perspective am I missing?
Mike,
I’ll reference the other post I created yesterday about the operational CIO versus the strategic CIO: http://www.hospitalemrandehr.com/2017/05/30/operational-cio-vs-strategic-cio/
Using that as a framework for reference, I think there are many IT organizations that are just operational IT organizations and so they aren’t involved (and many don’t want to be involved) in the later stages. If this is an IT organization’s approach, then the above graphic is accurate (and sadly it is true for many organizations).
If on the other hand you’re a strategic IT organization, then you’re likely involved in every step of the above chart. Sounds like this applies to you. It’s how I’d do it if I were IT in an organization as well.