Dr. Julie Jacko — Health Informatics for Better Patient Care
Modern medicine in the twenty first century has evolved and now brings new procedures, developments and medications. This has transformed patient care for the better, says Dr. Julie Jacko, a Professor par excellence. There is a need to collect data about patients and the impact of modern medicines and techniques so that there is a greater development in the future. Health informatics is bringing together all this information with the help of modern Information Technology. In short, health informatics is the combination of informational science, health care and computer technology. Dr. Julie Jacko with a PhD in Industrial Systems and Designs is particularly interested to contribute towards health informatics.
As early as the 1950s, health care experts realized the need to integrate health records of patients along with the use of computers, so that it would help future developments in the field of medicine. Originally, this process was called medical computing, but is now known as Health Informatics. By the year 1970, health informatics grew larger and revolutionized the medical world. To help better track treatment and patient progress, doctor’s offices, hospitals and even small clinics began to compile patient records via computer.
Dr. Julie Jacko as a Professor of Public Health at the University of Minnesota works towards research, teaching and outreach functions. Health informatics has a wider scope with the use of computers, various medical databases and the internet. There are many benefits of using health informatics as doctors now have the valuable information to treat patients effectively. The data retrieved by the use of heath informatics provides statistical information that can have a profound effect on how medicine is distributed, how surgeries are performed, and how healing is tracked.
Hospitals keep track of patient records, says Julie Jacko to treat them better in the future. The use of health informatics has opened up the doors for clinics to be more capable of treating patients in a more efficient manner, and helps these clinics refine their current process to make it more streamlined. Dr. Julie Jacko has 17 years of valuable and exhausting research which aims to advance life sciences, public health and patient care. To help keep more accurate and detailed records of patients, medical software and record keeping programs are constantly being upgraded with new programs also being added.
When patients arrive for treatment at a hospital or doctor’s clinic, the entire database available can help speed up the check-in process and the treatment. With the arrival of hand held portable devices, nurses and doctors can easily move throughout a large hospital or clinic, while still being able to access information at the touch of a button. Health informatics is also a powerful tool at dentist offices so oral surgeons and dentists can coordinate patient treatment. Medical professionals now have an easy to use, fast method of accessing patient’s past medical history, thanks to health informatics, says Julie Jacko.
