Effect of Information Technology and Computers on the Doctor's Consultation Process - Term Paper Example

Technology Management Name Course Tutor Date 1.0 Abstract United Kingdom is a nation, which has really advanced in computerization. Doctors in hospitals use computers while attending to customers in the consultation rooms. These are the rooms where the doctors get contact first with the patients. There is a wide variety of computer brands in practice today, that are customized to meet the needs of different practitioners in the health service industry. A consultation is considered good if it can meet expectations, needs, and concerns of patients. The doctor's ability to use information technology and computers has an effect on the consultation process. Regardless of the effects of computers and Information Technology's effect on consultation, it is difficult to integrate them into the entire system development process. The DSDM-Atern is a framework that can assist us in the integration of the consultation system into the entire hospital system. It is a structure of development, delivery, and management, of projects either related or not related to Information Technology. 2.0 Introduction Companies are operating in global environments that are dynamic, flexible, and fast moving. For this reason, companies need to establish systems that can keep up with the speed, at which changes occur, systems that can handle the increasing customer needs and expectations, and beat competition by availing quality goods and services to the market at a faster rate. As information systems advance across divisions, departments and companies, there is a necessity to develop concrete technological strategies that will promote efficiency in operations within and across companies. Whereas a company can get the best strategy available, its implementation and integration into the management information systems may affect its success. The company should develop systems that will take care of the needs of the general and specialized practitioners. The schemes should ensure rapid services that will guarantee clients are contented with the service. The system should also change the culture of the organizations emphasizing customer delivery, working together, being flexible and adaptive to changes, and ensuring quality service. To achieve this, the hospitals should use the services of DSDM-Atern to implement and develop the system (Richards, 2007, p. 62). 3.0 Overview of DSDM Atern approach DSDM is a structure based on the excellent custom to provide receptive and rapid deliverance of systems. The framework recognizes that user involvement is crucial to avoid the risks of the rejection of the project (Baltus, 2001, p.20). The goal of the project is to deliver on budget and on time while taking into account the changes during the project development process. It emphasis on doing something and getting it right the first time. The framework is based on nine principles, which have ensured its success. These principles include; i. Active involvement of the user- the system considers the importance of involving the user throughout a project. This improves the user acceptance of the project reducing the risks of rejection. Moreover, this reduces the error costs arising from the mistakes of users who have problems using the systems. ii. Teams should be allowed to make decisions. Participants in a project should be allowed to make decisions without having to consult the managers all the time. This will reduce transaction costs arising from constant interference from managers. In addition, representatives of a team should be able to make informed decisions relating to the whole team. iii. Frequent delivery-the framework recognizes that frequent deliveries will ensure that mistakes are detected and correct early enough. Is also ensures that the system implementation takes place within the budgeted time and costs. iv. Accepted deliverable- the framework endeavours to deliver outcomes that will solve all business problems and provide for future enhancements the system should take factor in the company requirements (Stapleton & DSDM Consortium, 2003, p.72). v. Mandatory incremental and iterative development-a project should be built on small packages to avoid complications in the development. New feature should be added until the project is complete. Moreover, it is necessary to get back to the previous project without losing the project. vi. Reversible changes-a project should be responsive to any changes during development. Every system should be flexible and adaptable to new and ever increasing changes in information technology. vii. High-level requirement-the framework holds that establishment of high-level requirement is necessary to limit the freedom of altering the development process. viii. Testing is an integrated part of the lifecycle-this should start with the first step of the lifecycle to detect any problems early enough. Constant testing offers feedback on the progress of the project. It also enables developers to know whether the prototypes will solve the organizations, problems. ix. Collaboration and cooperation- both business and technical staff should collaborate in any DSDM project to build trust and honesty. Representatives should be selected to in cases where not all the staff can be used in the project's team. 4.0 Use of DSDM to develop clinical systems – the best practice proposal The development of systems using the DSDM goes through a number of stages before adoption of the project. The process takes a series of different steps that build onto each other. These steps ensure that the development of the systems is chronological. In the development of clinical systems, the same steps will apply (Baltus, 2001, p.53). The pre-project stage This stage entails the initial definition of the problems that need to be addressed. In this case, the problem is integrating the consulting process with the other systems in the hospital. This stage entails defining the scope and extent of investigation to be undertaken to understand the extent of the project. At this stage, decision is made as to whether to continue of discontinue the project. In a hospital seeking to integrate its systems, this stage would entail defining investigations on how much money and time would be needed to develop the system. The project is assigned managers and a steering committee set to oversee the whole project. Finances and other resources are allocated for the project to start. The feasibility study stage This stage aims at establishing whether the proposed project will meet the requirement of the business, assess whether it would be suitable to apply DSDM, define the possible solutions to the problem, and outline estimates of the budget and timeline. The role of this stage assess whether there is a feasible solution to the problem. In a hospital, this stage will involve assessing whether it is feasible to integrate consultation system with the entire. At the end of this stage, the deliverables include, a feasibility report, the optional solution (feasibility prototype). An outline plan and a risk log (Office of Government Commerce, 2010). Business study stage This stage aims at developing a scope as to which processes will be continued and processes to be discontinued. It also outlines the developments of the prototypes in future. In the stage user representatives are selected, in this clinic setting, the representatives would be a doctor or a nurse to represent the others. Then, prioritization of the proposed system is done to ensure that the most crucial activities are handled first. This will involve developing prototypes that can be used to integrate the systems in the consultations rooms with the other systems. Reassessment of risks is the done again to identify if there are new risks facing the project. At the end of this stage, the deliverables are the definition of the business area, development plan, prioritized list of requirements, updated list of risks, and definition of system architecture. Functional model iteration stage The objective of this phase is to illustrate the functional model consisting of working and static prototypes. At the end of this phase, DSDM aims to have an implementation plan, updated list of risks, and record of functional and non-functional models, as the product. The developed models are tested to verify whether they will present the purpose of incorporating the entire system. Design and build iteration stage The objective of this phase is to revise the functional prototypes to address the requirements of the non-functional prototypes. At the end of this phase, the deliverable include, having a time box plan, review records, test records, and tested systems. This phase will help to determine whether the prototypes developed will be able to integrate the consultation process with the entire system. The implementation stage The objective of this stage is put the working prototypes into the systems of the users, train the users, support staff, and operators, and prospect the possible future requirements. This would entail training the doctors, health workers, nurses and the operators. The key products for this phase are a trained population, user documentation, review document and a delivered system. Post project stage This stage comprises of tasks the disbandment of the project. They include maintenance, support and a re-evaluation to ensure how the structure is functioning. The objective of this stage is to keep the new system operational and assess whether the benefits stated earlier are being achieved or not. This would entail checking whether the consultation process has been integrated in the entire system. This will assist in development and improvement processes. The deliverables in this stage include a review report and new releases on request for changes. 4.1 Approach for requirement identification The requirements of a project as defined by the DSDM are arranged into a hierarchy. On top of the hierarchy is the project objectives are contained in the Business visions. These are defined the phase of feasibility study. This is followed by the base-lined requirements, which are high level. They are captured in the foundations phase, and they describe the scope of the project. Lastly, the fine details that arise during explorations (Highsmith, 2002, p.45). The requirements can be identified based on whether they must, should, could or will not be done. The' must' requirements require over 60% of the total effort of the project. This forms the main reason for the project to start. If these requirements are de-scoped, the projects will some significant problems. The 'should' requirements are the expected requirements but are either costly or difficult. Their de-scoping can be done as a last resort to ensure that the project is on track. The 'could' requirement indicates works that are either cheap or easy and do not require much efforts. These requirements can be de-scoped without having any impacts on the project. The wont requirements can be left out of during the project. They have no influence on the project. 4.2 Defining system features The systems introduced will have biometric authorization. Having many doctors, nurses, and clinical staff do not necessarily raise concerns of security threats or multiple logins. The authorization feature will allow the system to tag specified data to specified clinician or doctor. People will have authorization passwords to areas that relate to their area. This means that no person will have access to data he/she is not authorized to access. The system implemented by DSDM user friendly. This allows all the clinicians to be able to use and access the system. Moreover, the DSDM emphasizes so much on collaboration and involvement of all users of the system. This means that the users already know how to work with the system as they took part in its developments and implementation. Manuals for the system are in place to ensure that employees who have problems can refer for assistance. The system will be tailor-made to satisfy each particular clinic. Different clinics deal with different services like eye services, dental services, paediatrician services while others are general clinics. These clinics require different systems depending on the services they offer. The consultation services also vary depending on the nature of services provided by the clinic. Moreover, the systems should fit the needs of different clinicians. The system will also be fast and efficient in serving the customers. The main aim of introducing the new system is improve service delivery for customers and reduce the time wasted in queues. Retrieval of customers' information will be easy after the system is put in place. Moreover, scheduling of appointments will be faster and easy (Voigt, 2004, p.71). Ever clinician should be able to access the information of a customer when need be. The system will also be flexible to enable crucial changes to be made without having to develop a new system. The system should be accommodative of the changes because we live in a world where technological change is so fast and inevitable. This will also save on the future costs of establishing new systems. 4.3 User involvement Collaboration forms one of the principles of DSDM framework. The framework holds that collaboration with all the stakeholders is very crucial because different people react differently to changes. The project should not isolate any staff who will be using the new system, as this would make implementation of the project harder. Nurses, doctors, health workers, and operators should be included in the project. In cases where it is hard to involve everyone in the project, then representatives should be selected to represent the others. The project should operate in an atmosphere of honesty, respect, and trust to be able to collect all the requirements. This will also allow honest feedback on the end product of the project (Huhl, 2001, p.31). The project team should comprise of all the users of the systems. No distinctions should be allowed regardless of whether a team member is a nurse, doctor, health worker, or operator. At this stage, they are all developers. The team should have a visionary leader who will be in charge of motivating the team and aligning project goals with those of the company. The leader should ensure that all the team members take in the process. The team should also have a project manager who manages the whole project. The project manager makes sure that the project runs efficiently and that it has the essential resources (Land, 2008, p.81). The team should involve all the stakeholders at appropriate times in the course of the project. This is to ensure the approval is done in time to ensure that there no delays in the projects. The management should be updated on a regular basis on the progress of the project. Moreover, the team representatives should be empowered to make decisions on behalf of others. This saves time when the representatives can make decisions without having to consult on the smallest detail. 5.0 Discussion For hospitals to fully integrate the consultation system with the entire, a hospital needs to get a system that will serve effectively and efficiently. The system should be able to improve customer service and reduce the waiting time on the queues. Hospitals can no longer afford to keep customers waiting on the benches. Customer expectations have gone up and hospitals cannot risk losing their customers to other hospitals. The system should also ease retrieval of customer information from the data storage department. The hospitals should plan for the system to be certain that the hospital get the right system the first they introduce it. This will avoid the later costs to change the system. To ensure that the hospital gets the right system the first time, they should use DSDM framework. The framework is based on the ideas that companies should establish systems and make sure the systems are right. Using the framework, the company avoids the risk of the system failing soon after its implementation (Wolfer, 2004, p.88). DSDM emphasizes so much on collaboration and working together for people working in the same company. The same should happen when the hospitals are setting up new systems. Doctors, nurses, operators, and all clinicians should own the process of developing new system in the consultation rooms. This will create a sense of ownership and ease implementation. As the hospitals develop the system, constant follow up, testing and feedback should be undertaken so that any deviations from the development process is noted early enough. This will help alleviate risks of investing heavily in a system bound to collapse soon after implementation. In addition, all users should be trained adequately to ensure that they could use the system easily. Moreover, training manuals and document should be written to help users handle any problems that may arise (Isomaki, 2010, p.32). The hospital should develop systems that are flexible and adaptive to technological changes. Technological changes take place so rapidly and hospitals need establish systems that can adapt to such changes. Failure to do this, hospitals will be forced to develop new systems every time new inventions take place. This will be very costly for the hospital. 6.0 Conclusion The DSDM framework is built on principles that help organizations to implement projects and new systems. It gets its strength from extendibility and simplicity that allows the process to be understood easily. The principle of cooperation and user engagement allows easy implementation of the projects and systems as chances of rejection are minimized. People are involved all through the project, and they understand fully what the project is about. Continuous testing and feedback allows the framework to detect any deviations or mistakes and corrective actions taken in time. This reduces the risk of failure of the systems, as all the mistakes will be corrected by the time the project gets to completion and implementation. Consultations rooms in hospitals provide the initial contact between the doctors and the patients. The doctors get to examine the physical state of the patients. Integrating the systems in the consultation rooms will enable the entire clinic to have a continuous flow of operations. The integrated system will notify the next patient when the consultation room is empty and they can enter. In addition, the system will assist the doctors to communicate with other doctors on the case of specific patients without having to move physically. Moreover, the doctor can consult from his consultation room. Clinics should use the DSDM framework to integrate the systems in the consultations room with the entire information system. DSDM will enable clinics to develop customized systems that will fit the need of the medical practitioners or specialist in the clinic. However, it can also develop a general system that will enable every any general practitioner and other users in the clinic to use without complications. References Baltus, B 2001, Software quality: state of the art in management, testing, and tools, London, Springer. Highsmith, J 2002, Agile Software Development Ecosystems, Addison-Wesley. Huhl, L 2001, Optimising Business Performance with Standard Software Systems, Sydney, Birkhäuser. Isomaki, H 2010, Reframing Humans in Information Systems Development, New York, Springer. Land, M 2008, Information systems development: challenges in practice, theory, and education, New York, Cengage Learning. Office of Government Commerce, 2010, Delivering It Services Using Itil, Prince2 and Dsdm Atern, New York, The Stationery Office. Richards, K et-al. 2007, Agile Project Management: Running Prince2 Projects with DSDM Atern, New York, The Stationery Office. Stapleton, J, & DSDM Consortium, 2003, DSDM: business focused development, London, Addison-Wesley. Voigt, B 2004, Dynamic System Development Method, Zurich, University of Zurich. Wolfer, L 2004, Health care administration, New York, Jones & Bartlett Learning. Read More