To Investigate the Effectiveness of Electronic Health Records Management System for Improved Health Services in Zambia: A case study at Ng'ombe Health Centre

Abstract

Electronic Health Records were created for service delivery in health institutions. They have the advantage of paper-based patient records in that ,they are easy to use ,retrieve information and have unlimited storage as well solve the problem of storage faced in the paper-based record system. As indicated in most studies, EHRs come with own challenges. Therefore, the main aim of this study investigate the effectiveness of Electronic Health Records Management System for improving health service delivery at Ng’ombe Health Centre .The specific objectives of the study were; to find out the optimal benefits utilization of e-health records management system at the health care facilities ;To determine whether the introduction of e-health records at health care facilities has reduced on the number of medical errors ;to determine the cost effectiveness of e-health records at health care facility and to establish the challenges faced in using e-health records at the health care facility .The study used both quantitative and qualitative method to collect and analyses data. 300 respondents were picked and using simple random sampling and 1 key-informant using purposive sampling. The major findings revealed that EHRs are faster to use than paper-based records and saves filing space. Findings also showed that most respondents indicated that EHRs are cost effective in terms of time in that less time is spent by staff to access records and no time is wasted in queues to retrieve records compared to the paper-based. Findings also showed that most of respondents pointed out that the major medical error reduced was that of loss of patient records and repeating of diagnostic tests. The major challenge pointed was that of electricity power outages and it was recommended that back-up measures should be put in place such as procuring power generators. Finally, there is need too for other researchers to consider finding out whether all other institutions use EHRs as N’gombe does and establish if the benefits and challenges are the same.