Healthcare Guide for EHR software development

Introduction to EHR Software

Are you planning to develop a hospital-oriented EMR software, but wondering how to create it and more importantly, why to develop EHR?

In this post, we’re going to discuss both HOW and WHY. Developing software and applications requires elaborate planning.

There are a lot of regulations and guidelines.

They create some unique challenges for web developers and originators. EHR software development includes operating through all certain obstacles.

It is essential for medical healthcare applications as it holds various benefits that help us in today’s digital era.

Digitalization in the medical and healthcare industry leads to several enhancements.

Despite enhancing patient-physician relations, there are changes in record-making and healthcare data extraction.

Developing EHR software is important in the continuously growing technological market and work sphere.

This system offers an entire picture of the patient’s health to the doctors.

An EHR system allows you to access the health-related data of each patient and helps to interchange the paperwork.

Healthcare-based companies are thriving to provide excellent customer experience and care, but they face challenges while improving the quality of care delivered, boosting work productivity, and managing the operations.

Moreover, it brings self-regulation and automation into the healthcare organization. 

So to overcome such challenges and build web-based patient portals, Hire TatvaSoft – healthcare software development company having years of experience in delivering a bunch of reliable services such as advanced EHR and EMR solutions for sharing the patient’s health records as well as resulting in enhanced customer experience and operational efficiency. 

In this article, we’re going to learn healthcare guides for EHR software development including the requirement for custom EHR development, features and functionalities, advantages, and much more.

So, without any further ado, let’s get started!

What is EHR software?

EHR refers to an electronic health record that is a centralized digital collection of patients’ health information that has entirely replaced paperwork in most behavioral health practices. 

It is basically a computer system that helps healthcare service providers to manage patient health records and automate clinical workflows.

Despite this, it also allows you to see patients remotely with telemedicine sessions and guide medications electronically.

Sync information with practice management and billing systems.

Common information included in a patient EHR consists of medical history, current and past medications, laboratory results, allergy alerts, and demographic data.

Currently, if your practice does not use any computerized recording software, advancing in it now could be one of the best things you can do to boost efficiency and overcome costs.

Need for Custom EHR development

Sometimes it becomes important to develop a customized EHR system that helps to meet the requirements of and respond to the challenges of practice more dependable than a generic system.

It offers an intuitive experience than out-of-the-box records systems gratitude to specialty-specific tools, templates, and more. 

Here are major reasons why EHR development is required for the healthcare industry:

1. Implement all the required features

If you’re developing a modern healthcare record system, it contains functionalities for chronic disease management, surgery management, e-prescribing, and behavioral health.

Apart from this, it also provides drug diversion tools that make sure to use proper prescribing methods. 

EHR development helps you to choose the features required by your healthcare practice.

Similarly, you’re not required to implement unwanted features that will confuse your employees and induce them to succumb to a mind-blowing collection of options. 

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2. Quick support

Some users criticized Epic customer support and suggested that it is not responsive to improvement requests about simple tasks that can be performed quickly by adding a button in specific areas.

When you’re developing an EHR system with a development partner, you can expect thorough initial research and testing functionalities by end-users along with the implementation of improvements requests and analysis.

We establish a process for receiving feedback of functionalities under test while building healthcare software. 

3. Training end-users

You’ll be surprised to know that your EHR software development partner can also help you to train your staff and make sure regarding further maintenance and support.

Let’s say, if you require new features, your partner will be available for you at that time. 

EHR Software Key features

Let’s have a look at EHR key features to give you some insights into what functionalities are necessary to the daily healthcare service organization and what it takes to create a product with those features.

#1. Managing tasks

The EHR system allocates job responsibilities, redirects and authorizes them to other companies, and observes their completion. 

#2. Lab integration

It empowers healthcare providers to observe the delivery of track results, test samples, and integrate the acquired information with patients’ charts.

#3. Automated scheduling

The EHR app introduces the information within the scheduling system to keep it modernized about the most recent appointments.

#4. Document and image management 

It allows users to scan and attach certificates and pictures to patient plans and follow documents into the database.

#5. Processing claims

The system collects the clients’ feedback to determine their level of comfort and satisfaction and take timely steps to eliminate reliability risks.

#6. E-prescribing

Through e-prescribing, physicians and doctors can convey medicines electronically, track patients’ prescriptions, and send notifications automatically.

#7. Chat

It allows physicians to guide patients on fitness queries utilizing reliable direct messages.

EHR Software Development Tech Stack

Customized websites are developed from scratch.

In terms of technical filling, a custom site consists of front-end and back-end components, connected with the help of the Application Programming Interface.

The EHR system requires a technology stack for development. 

If you are planning to develop a customized electronic healthcare record system, here are some recommendations for the front-end, back-end, and API technology stack that you need to go through:

Front-end

Web users communicate with the front-end elements of the healthcare system.

It includes the user interface and design of the electronic health records software.

Here, we have short-listed the most common and popular technologies used for it.

Web

Here are the most commonly used markup and programming languages for a web platform:

• HTML5
• CSS3
• JavaScript

Angular and React are the most commonly used JavaScript Frameworks for an EHR system.

iOS

Do you know which is the most widely used programming language for an EHR iOS platform? If no, here it is:

• Swift 5 (preferred)
• Objective C

XCode11 and AppCode are the two widely-used development OS for an EHR iOS platform. Whereas the most commonly used platform SDK is iOS SDK and Cocoa Touch for an EHR iOS platform.

Android

Here are the two most widely used programming languages for your EHR platform:

• Kotlin (preferred)
• Java

macOS and Ubuntu are the two programming languages that are mostly used for an EHR android platform.  

Backend

The back-end of the EHR system refers to the part with which the user cannot communicate quickly, but it is where the principal functions take place.

It is the server-side of the EHR software that works with information and all the necessary results on the front-end. Here are some recommendations for several back-end components:

Application Programming Interfaces

APIs are tools that work as a bridge between the front-end and back-end functionalities and connect third-party tools for facilitating multiple service features. Here are some recommendations for APIs in EHR software:

*Table data: https://mlsdev.com/blog/ehr-development

7 Steps to make your EHR/EMR system HIPAA compliant

1. Authorization

You have to be very careful when it comes to accessing the information.

Make sure who, when, and why someone accesses the information. Employees can only access the information that they absolutely require and nothing more. 

To ensure this, you’re required to establish various access levels for different user roles on your EMR platform.

Once you’re done with it, identify the privileges of each employee regarding patient information, so that a particular employee can only access the information that is necessary and keep some parts of ePHI in ‘read-only’ mode.

2. Authentication

Whenever a user logs in, ensure the user is who he says he is.

This is known as authentication.

When the system authenticates the user who logs in, then and then only he/she is allowed to access the EHR with the appropriate rights and permissions.

3. Encryption

The requirements are addressable, it is totally up to you to decide whether you want to encrypt data and if yes, then when?

But if you’re not required to do it, then make sure you’re investing a good amount of time in documented reasons for not doing it.

4. Automatic log-off

To restrict unauthorized access, it is essential to implement an automatic log-off in your EMR system.

By doing this, the session is terminated after some time when the system is not in use. 

It is you, who can determine what time it should be — 10, 15, 20, or more minutes, so it becomes more convenient for your personnel.

5. Business associate addendum

BAA is an agreement/contract that you have to register with any 3rd party service provider that will have access to your patient’s sensitive information.

It is important when it comes to medical records and HIPAA-compliant software because they make everyone involved in EHR handling responsible.

6. Audits and alerts

You need to know about any breach when it takes place so that you can take timely measures.

It is only possible with audits and alerts.

You can only preserve ePHI if you’re aware of what happens to it at all times, who uses it, what actions are performed by the users, and lastly, if he is authorized to do it or not. 

7. HIPAA Compliant Hosting and infrastructure

If you are planning to develop your own customized EHR system, you must choose a HIPAA-compliant hosting solution before you start building it.

You can choose from 3rd party data storage solutions, on-site hosting, and cloud hosting. 

Final Thoughts

Let’s revise the essential factors we covered in this article.

A HIPAA compliant EHR allows access only authorized data to particular users,  automatically ends the sessions when the system is not in use, inspects all user activity and senses signals whenever anything unusual happens, and is hosted at HIPAA compliant servers and infrastructure. 

So, this is how you can develop custom EMR software. Here we discussed how the EHR system helps to streamline the administrative system and how to build an efficient EHR system. 

SAHIL BATRA

Hi, I’m the Founder and Developer of Paramedics World, a blog truly devoted to Paramedics. I am a Medical Lab Tech, a Web Developer and Bibliophiliac. My greatest hobby is to teach and motivate other peoples to do whatever they wanna do in life.