Dashboards are very good
visual/graphical analytical tools that provide a central point of
summary information in an easy to read and understand format in
real-time for quick and actionable decision making.
Dashboards are a key feature of Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Developers and
IT enthusiasts spend many man hours, splicing, slicing and dicing data
to avail management with the aim of providing an accurate up-to-date
"snapshot" of the state of affairs in the organisation
at a glance. However, getting the dashboard data right in the healthcare
sector can mean life or death.
Dashboard Data
The colourful graphs displaying varying colourful data-sets are critical
in healthcare. The healthcare sector demands that good data goes into
healthcare systems if the human life ecosystem is to avoid health
epidemics as has been witnessed in recent history
in the case of ebola and HN1 flu. Good data provides readable graphs or
charts that lead to prompt decision making.
Suffice to say graphing tools have been around, especially with the
advent of spreadsheet tools like Cicero, Lotus 123 and or MS Excel, for a
while, but countless organisations are known to have gone out of
business for ignoring them. Despite the speedometer
lingering in the red zone, or the forecast graph trending in the
opposite wrong direction, a call to change direction was never made, but
this does not form the basis of this discussion, and could lead to
arguments that would go on till the sun falls down.
Regardless, the key is to respond to the warning data on the dashboard
promptly.
Healthcare Hotspot
Some of the greatest challenges with healthcare is that disease sources
range from water, earth/dirt, air bourne and also crossing from animals
to human and human to human. This multitude of vector sources pause a
challenge to healthcare providers, requiring
efficient capability to capture and analyse all these sources of data,
and aptly present it timely, extrapolating complexities like root
causes, sources of the problem, impact and threat paused including risk
of spreading so as to effect prompt and effective
preventive action.
Capturing causative factors of a disease especially in case of an
outbreak is still a challenge today. Even more sad is the accurate
reporting of cause of death. A lot of this is misreported, the level of
misdiagnosis is under-reported, yet if correct data
is captured and fed into dashboards, constrained resources can be
directed to where they are needed most, to take corrective action. There
was a time when all signs of vomiting or diarrhoea were attributed to
HIV, and many HIV negative souls perished. Fortunately
great improvements in awareness and diagnosis have reversed this.
Response Strategy
Microsoft Dynamics CRM is an Enterprise class technology. Its
customisable capabilities need to be exploited to the full. For
instance, Balanced Scorecards data embedded in dashboards that show
measures falling short of targets enable clinicians take a combination
of proactive corrective action early, saving and prolonging lives as
opposed to firefighting and resultant loss of lives or degraded quality
of life.
Good incident spatial data,
entered at the earliest available opportunity is crucial in case of a
health epidemic outbreak. If Operational Intelligence is also used,
containment measures are more effective. This data
type should also be pushed into an alert pipeline like text, fax, email,
beeper and emergency notification routes for prompt action and two way
feedback.
It's also vital to exploit
the integration capability of the technolpgy with external monitors and
sensors for more accurate data results in real-time. Within the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM dashboards, results based measures
can also be displayed based on CRM goals. Benchmarking can also be
designed into the dashboard. Benchmarking health facilities ensures,
those that are under performing strive, through various achievable
improvement measures to reach their peer standard.
The ability to forecast events can be increased if dashboards collect
relevant data in time. In addition they are invaluable tools when it
comes to timely emergency response if accessible to relevant staff.
Dashboard Team
The graphs and indicators availed on the dashboard is information that
should be acted on quickly and effectively. For instance, an emergency
situation may arise and in responding to it, resources may be found in
short supply in specific skills areas. The cholera
outbreak after the Haiti earthquake highlighted a shortage of Doctors to
treat sufferers and this led to a training drive to increase specialist
in treating cholera in Haiti.
Dashboards are worth their
weight in gold, if they are well designed and availed to those that are
supposed to act on them. This dashboard team should also have it's own
command and control structure, with enough resources
to act at a moments notice and have the ability to identify resource
management, availability and replenishment issues.