Use of Technology in Healthcare Environments

Use of Technology in Healthcare Environments

The use of technology is becoming an increasingly incorporated aspect of all healthcare environments. In general, the technology trends in school healthcare, related to information and data, are continuously moving towards the direction of electronic methods. For example, a huge trend I am noticing is the use of telehealth because we often must do telehealth with parents when deciding if kids can/should stay home, when to get tested for COVID, or when to return to school. We also use telehealth in our school when one nurse calls out, and a single nurse must cover all the schools. There are multiple buildings spread across our campus, so we often use telehealth with teachers as well to decide when a student in another building truly needs to be seen, or if they should just be sent home or given a simple ice pack, band aid, or hot pack. A challenge with this, however, is of course the issue of not being able to fully capture the physical status of patients. Therefore, in essence, an error is diagnosing the students and treating them via telehealth always has the potential risk of missing crucial assessment data. Another technology trend is wearable technology, which is being seen much more with diabetic students who have monitors to track their glucose levels. These monitors are tied to apps and sometimes the electronic medical record systems, which allow for instant connection of data. The network of using mobile apps that connect with patient monitors allows for instant connection between patients and their providers, optimizing patient care through efficient and accurate data sharing (Skiba, 2017). A risk of this, however, is fact that when you have information on multiple outlets, there’s a slightly bigger chance of having this information exposed to more eyes than necessary.