Creating a risk-free hospital environment for patients, healthcare workforce and visitors through technology

ABSTRACT

Patient healthcare and management has taken leaps and bounds in advancement with the myriad technological innovations available to us now. The COVID-19 pandemic, while initially a setback, proved to be a springboard for the adoption and adaptation of cutting-edge technology that is crucial to our survival as a species. Examples of such are MySejahtera, vaccine production, genomic studies, contact tracing devices, alternative and green modes of transportation, increasing use of contactless food delivery services, and many more. The main challenges to hospital service providers are to integrate digital healthcare technologies into traditional hospital services with the aim to create a transparent and highly efficient healthcare system without walls or barriers. Hospital executives should be planning on how to integrate technology into newly built facilities and retrofit older facilities to enable a seamless integration between all components in healthcare services. As a healthcare administrator, minimization of patient safety-related risks is my foremost priority. While the benefits of health information technology are legion and can be used to enhance patient safety to an unprecedented level, I believe we should proceed with caution to ensure that patient welfare is our utmost priority, whilst also upgrading our services alongside our healthcare technology. The spread of COVID-19 stretched healthcare operational systems to their limits not only in Malaysia, but worldwide as well. Shortages and shortfalls had to be swiftly addressed, and as the director of the main COVID-19 hospital, the speaker has had a wealth of experience optimizing and modernizing response mechanisms. The speaker will share examples of improvements made for crisis response during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, centralized clinical command centers, hospital dashboards, virtual conferences, virtual learning, and many more. The speaker will also share some of the roles that a healthcare leader must focus on to prepare an organization for the adoption and use of future technology as well as readiness of organizational capabilities for long-term success. Technology for healthcare must be balanced by an appropriate level of human clinical expertise for final decision-making to ensure that patients receive high quality and safe care.