Zayas-Cabán Teresa, Haque Saira Naim, Kemper Nicole
Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, Washington, District of Columbia, United States.
RTI International, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, United States.
Appl Clin Inform. 2021 May;12(3):686-697. doi: 10.1055/s-0041-1731744. Epub 2021 Jul 28.
Workflow automation, which involves identifying sequences of tasks that can be streamlined by using technology and modern computing, offers opportunities to address the United States health care system's challenges with quality, safety, and efficiency. Other industries have successfully implemented workflow automation to address these concerns, and lessons learned from those experiences may inform its application in health care.
Our aim was to identify and synthesize (1) current approaches in workflow automation across industries, (2) opportunities for applying workflow automation in health care, and (3) considerations for designing and implementing workflow automation that may be relevant to health care.
We conducted a targeted review of peer-reviewed and gray literature on automation approaches. We identified relevant databases and terms to conduct the searches across sources and reviewed abstracts to identify 123 relevant articles across 11 disciplines.
Workflow automation is used across industries such as finance, manufacturing, and travel to increase efficiency, productivity, and quality. We found automation ranged from low to full automation, and this variation was associated with task and technology characteristics. The level of automation is linked to how well a task is defined, whether a task is repetitive, the degree of human intervention and decision-making required, and the sophistication of available technology. We found that identifying automation goals and assessing whether those goals were reached was critical, and ongoing monitoring and improvement would help to ensure successful automation.
Use of workflow automation in other industries can inform automating health care workflows by considering the critical role of people, process, and technology in design, testing, implementation, use, and ongoing monitoring of automated workflows. Insights gained from other industries will inform an interdisciplinary effort by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology to outline priorities for advancing health care workflow automation.
工作流程自动化涉及识别可通过使用技术和现代计算进行简化的任务序列，为应对美国医疗保健系统在质量、安全和效率方面的挑战提供了机会。其他行业已成功实施工作流程自动化来解决这些问题，从这些经验中吸取的教训可能会为其在医疗保健中的应用提供参考。
我们的目标是识别并综合（1）各行业当前的工作流程自动化方法，（2）在医疗保健中应用工作流程自动化的机会，以及（3）与医疗保健相关的设计和实施工作流程自动化的注意事项。
我们对同行评审文献和灰色文献中关于自动化方法进行了有针对性的综述。我们确定了相关数据库和检索词，以便在各种来源中进行检索，并对摘要进行评审，以从11个学科中识别出123篇相关文章。
工作流程自动化应用于金融、制造和旅游等多个行业，以提高效率、生产力和质量。我们发现自动化程度从低到全自动化不等，这种差异与任务和技术特征相关。自动化水平与任务定义的清晰程度、任务是否重复、所需的人工干预和决策程度以及现有技术的复杂程度有关。我们发现，确定自动化目标并评估这些目标是否达成至关重要，持续的监测和改进将有助于确保自动化的成功。
通过考虑人员、流程和技术在自动化工作流程的设计、测试、实施、使用和持续监测中的关键作用，其他行业中工作流程自动化的应用可为医疗保健工作流程的自动化提供参考。从其他行业获得的见解将为卫生信息技术国家协调员办公室的跨学科工作提供参考，以概述推进医疗保健工作流程自动化的优先事项。
