Informatics is the study of computational systems and information processing. It is to transform information and data into knowledge, so it is accessible to anyone in need. The transition of information into knowledge should help the people in need by creating a new process or making an existing process better. Informatics is an umbrella term for other specific studies, and health informatics is one part of it. There are many interesting topics under health informatics, but one topic I am very interested in is care transitions.

Care transitions, also known as transitional care, are services patients receive to have a safe and effective hand off between heath care facilities or even for discharge to go home. Care transitions is an important step in the healthcare process for both the patients and providers. These services are usually time sensitive and the correct medical history and information needs to be conveyed to all doctors and nurses seeing the patient across all facilities. Care transition can affect older patients that have to move through facilities a lot and acute care patients. There are times when all the medical history is not transferred properly through all the doctors and this can cause an error in the patients’ diagnosis and treatment. Due to the hospital’s ineffectiveness and lack of organization, patients could be waiting to be discharged longer than necessary and be billed for all the extra days. This may cause the hospitals profit to briefly increase, but it causes the patients satisfaction to decrease.

I believe one way to increase effectiveness is to design a mobile application that will give the patient and the doctors all the same information. This information includes contact information of other facilities, discharge information and schedule, lab reports, and so on. The application can also have future appointment dates and test dates in a calendar and any notes included by the doctor on more specific treatment plans. This is an informatics challenge because it relates back to the definition. There are many systems in place for care transitions, but there are always ways to make the systems more effective. Using informatics for care transitions helps transform all the medical information and present it to the patients and providers in a way that is easy for everyone to access and understand.

An article by Mackenzie Bean, a writer for the Becker’s Hospital newsletter, called 4 strategies to improve care transitions, really opened my eyes about a few problems that occur in care transition. The article focuses on post-acute care patients and the challenges they face that are out of their control. Jay LaBine, a MD and Spectrum Health, stated that he realized something was wrong when a veterinarian took more time to discuss the post care instructions with him about his dog than a physician spends with a patient to discuss their care after discharge. The article then addresses that Doctor Jay LaBine partnered with naviHealth to manage the hospital care transitions better. Mackenzie goes on to communicate why there is a strong need for care transitions and how to improve it. The article discusses the need for a patient care model rather than a business model. It was crucial that the hospital staff assess the patient’s medical history and treatment as precisely as possible to review the post-acute care instructions, length of stay, and discharge dates. Progress was made once doctors from different facilities discussed the patients care and proactive discharge was planned.