Healthcare Data Aggregation
QUESTION
Why does health care data need to be aggregated? In the data aggregation process, what is the impact of using information that is assigned a code as opposed to free text data?
Healthcare Data Aggregation
ANSWER
Healthcare Data Aggregation
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Healthcare Data Aggregation
There are numerous forms of data in the healthcare setting. Patient health information, physician notes, laboratory results, billing note, and others form the bulk of the healthcare information. This information needs to be organized and used structurally across many healthcare settings. Therefore, data aggregation is conducted whereby the data is searched, gathered, organized, and presented in the report based or even cod-based form. Data aggregation allows for the analysis and interpretation of data for clinical or administrative use. In the healthcare setting, there is patient data and aggregated data. The patient data is specific to one patient and is a product of practitioner-patent interaction. However, aggregated data is shared across many healthcare facilities and multiple patients. Aggregation of data is quite crucial for providing planning and guidance for the performance of health systems. Besides, aggregation of data also enables nurses and physicians to understand patient data more, understand key trends in healthcare, and share information (Guo et al., 2020). There is the ease of interprofessional healthcare collaboration in providing evidence-based treatment ad clinical administration solutions through data aggregation. In data aggregation, information from multiple E.H.R databases is combined to produce cohesive and consistent information that is shareable. Data aggregation is quite transformational to healthcare and has enabled better care provision and enabled better practices and patient outcomes.
Information or data may be stored in terms of free text form or as coded information. Both these approaches have their pros and cons. The coded data may be accessed and used by only the authorized specialist healthcare personnel (Miranda-Escalada et al., 2019). Free-text is advantageous as it presents the data in the natural form that has not been manipulated. It has a specificity lacking in coded data. However, the use of coded data provides accuracy in keeping the patient records and assessing the financial aspects of healthcare, such as billing or reimbursement of physicians.
References
Guo, C., Tian, P., & Choo, K. K. R. (2020). Enabling Privacy-assured Fog-based Data Aggregation in E-healthcare Systems. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics.
Miranda-Escalada, A., Gonzalez-Agirre, A., Armengol-Estapé, J., & Krallinger, M. (2020). Overview of automatic clinical coding: annotations, guidelines, and solutions for non- English clinical cases at codes track of CLEF eHealth 2020. In Working Notes of Conference and Labs of the Evaluation (CLEF) Forum. CEUR Workshop Proceedings.