Health IT Evaluation Project

Health information technology (IT) is largely utilized for the purposes of improving care, healthcare quality, and patient safety. Implementing health IT systems in healthcare organizations is an incredibly expensive, detailed endeavor. Oftentimes, large project implementations, while intended to increase efficiency, ultimately do not live up to the potential. The causes for this are multifaceted, and thus early stages of evaluation are necessary to avoid costly and dangerous technology failures (Cusack et al., 2009).

The purpose of this project is for you to perform an evaluation of a proposed health IT system in your place of employment, using components of the Health Information Technology Evaluation Toolkit published by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). If your organization is not considering implementing any new technology in the near future, you may elect to evaluate the process that was completed for a health IT system already in existence.

The Health IT Evaluation Toolkit  by Cusack, et al. is also listed on the Require Reading page as a Resource. The toolkit should be used as a guide for the student to write APA style formatted word document(s) that include the sections for the different assignments. 

Week 3: Health IT Evaluation Toolkit Assignment (Part 1)

For this week’s assignment, complete sections I-V of the Health IT Evaluation Toolkit. APA formatting (with the exception of an abstract) is required for this submission. For section II of the toolkit, be sure to select two or more important stakeholders and discuss their goals and vision for success of this proposed project implementation.

Week 5: Health IT Evaluation Toolkit Assignment (Part 2)

For this week’s assignment, complete sections VI – X of the Health IT Evaluation Toolkit. APA formatting (with the exception of an abstract) is required for this submission.

Week 7: Health IT Evaluation Toolkit Assignment (Part 3)

For this week’s assignment, complete sections XI – XV of the Health IT Evaluation Toolkit. APA formatting (with the exception of an abstract) is required for this submission.

Week 9: Health IT Evaluation Toolkit Assignment (Part 4)

For this week’s assignment, complete sections XVI – XVII of the Health IT Evaluation Toolkit. APA formatting (with the exception of an abstract) is required for this submission.

Week 11: Final System Evaluation Project paper

For this week’s assignment, complete section XVIII of the Health IT Evaluation Toolkit. APA formatting (including an abstract) is required for this submission.

In earlier weeks your assignment deliverables are formative components of the toolkit. This week, you will turn in your completed project, which is the total evaluation.

Your final submission, the evaluation plan, should be formatted as follows:

1. Short description of the      project
2. Goals of the project
3. Questions to be answered by the      evaluation effort
4. First measure to be evaluated –      quantitative
   1. Overview – general       considerations
   2. Timeframe
   3. Study design/comparison group
   4. Data collection plan
   5. Analysis plan
   6. Power/sample size calculations
5. Second measure to be evaluated      – qualitative
   1. Overview – general       considerations
   2. Timeframe
   3. Study design
   4. Data collection plan
   5. Analysis plan
6. Subsequent measures to be      evaluated in the same format