Over the last decade, there have been more than 4,000 data breaches in healthcare organizations. Unfortunately, a lot of those data breaches come from poorly organized or secure data.
The solution to these sensitive issues in the healthcare industry is simple: data governance. Better yet, an efficient data governance plan that can clear up numerous data problems in healthcare organizations.
In this guide, we’ll check out how data governance functions in healthcare organizations, and how it can drive better outcomes.
Easier Patient Matching and Identification
Issues with patient identification and matching are some of the most common problems in the healthcare industry. Not only can incorrect patient matching impact treatment, but it can also affect overall patient satisfaction scores and reimbursement rates. That can cause you to start losing clientele, resulting in lower revenue overall. Data governance, however, sets up processes and best practices to prevent these types of outcomes.
One of the most efficient data governance practices is to use unique identifiers for each patient. These identifiers can be in the form of numerical codes without relying on variable demographics to match patient records. When your patients have unique identifiers, it can prevent file duplication and conflated records. These also reduce the chances of experiencing the consequences of improper data governance.
To some extent, most healthcare organizations use these identifiers in the form of treatment codes. The same type of code system applies to patients, making the prescription and patient record process much faster, smoother, and harder to compromise.
Aside from unique identifiers, you can also store patient information in a cloud data store. Doing this can help store information in a single location to ensure that there are no duplicated records.
Improved Patient Engagement and Data Access
Patient records should always be accessible to the patients. These records prevent miscommunication and mishaps that could potentially lead to legal issues. Additionally, it can boost patient engagement with their healthcare providers.
A good data governance strategy should give patients secure access to their data, typically through cloud-based data centers. Alternatively, this could be through a mobile app or another information hub that allows limited access to patients upon providing their patient identifier or another form of ID.
Data governance can also regulate who can access patient information. This should include healthcare providers, the patient themselves, and limited access to other users that the patient requests.
Even when multiple people access specific data at a certain time, providers can guarantee that no breaches will occur by storing information in a secure location with MFA systems in place to prevent unauthorized access.
Customized Workflows
Healthcare organizations tend to be complex, spanning various departments and involving multiple providers and services. As a result, healthcare institutions constantly struggle with creating tailored and streamlined workflows.
A good data governance strategy can help streamline these workflows and customize them to a particular organization’s needs. It’s also critical in integrating alerts, data-driven risk scores, and insights.
Having a customized workflow ensures accurate information delivery to prevent organizational and communication issues. The larger an organization is, the more important this type of workflow is to the success of the business as it streamlines interdisciplinary communication, creating a smoother patient process.
Additionally, customized workflows help eliminate irrelevant data from provider processes. In doing so, it ensures that only pertinent information is given to providers.
Improved Patient Analytics
Data governance can also improve patient analytics. Aside from the information providers obtain about medical conditions, essential non-clinical factors help dictate patient care.
Health’s social determinants include food insecurity or transportation barriers. While a patient’s health is not directly stated, the analysis can still impact chronic disease management, utilization rates, and patient engagement.
Data governance helps screen environmental and social factors, which can affect more than 70% of health outcomes. It can also enable natural language processing, automatically extracting only meaningful data related to a patient’s socioeconomic needs.
Additionally, because of the efficiency of data governance, healthcare providers can address challenges to improve patient care. They can also connect them with community services to help reduce socioeconomic pressure.
Improved Data Security
With digital information on the rise, more people suffer from breaches and invasion of privacy. In fact, there are an estimated 400 data breaches in healthcare each year.
An updated and well-performing data governance ensures only the right people have access to all relevant information. At the same time, it gives teams within your organization the data access they need.
There are various ways in which data governance can boost your institution’s cybersecurity. For one thing, data governance helps maintain regulatory compliance, especially during critical periods. This keeps sensitive information protected and safe from potential breaches. Data governance also allows better risk identification, especially in patients. This enables healthcare providers to streamline processes and treatment decisions better.
Additionally, it guarantees data quality, ensures all information is accurate and consistent without getting misused.
Final Thoughts
Data governance can improve a number of outcomes in healthcare, both tangible and intangible. Whether it’s better patient matching or more customized workflows, data governance may just be the secret to unlocking success in your organization.
Data governance helps prepare your institution for future cybersecurity efforts which can be made by forming a team solely dedicated to guarding and protecting your patients’ data. Of course, all of that requires you to have a strong data governance strategy in place. Set one up today to get started transforming the outcomes within your healthcare organization.
