Professional values and informatics: what is the connection?
General practitioners (GPs) need to feel that they are doing a good job in providing care of high quality in a humane manner – that they are ‘good’ doctors. The General Medical Council booklet Good Medical Practice is full of imperatives, but short on values that are the determinants of behaviour. M...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT
2004-05-01
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| Series: | Journal of Innovation in Health Informatics |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://hijournal.bcs.org/index.php/jhi/article/view/113 |
| _version_ | 1818518349216219136 |
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| author | Peter Pritchard |
| author_facet | Peter Pritchard |
| author_sort | Peter Pritchard |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | General practitioners (GPs) need to feel that they are doing a good job in providing care of high quality in a humane manner – that they are ‘good’ doctors. The General Medical Council booklet Good Medical Practice is full of imperatives, but short on values that are the determinants of behaviour. Much has been written on doctors’ professional values in the past decade, but it is not easy for individual GPs and teams to define their own values and consider to what extent they live up to them. Values and informatics, at first glance, might seem to have little in common, or even to be mutually antipathetic, and this is possible within the limitations of current technology. However, providing high-quality care involves the application of knowledge, evidence and guidelines, as well as auditing outcomes. For all these tasks, informatics provides the essential means of discovering whether we, as individuals and teams, are living up to our espoused values so that they become values-in-action that drive behaviour. Application of advanced informatics has the potential to improve and measure diagnostic and therapeutic skills. Technical advances are impressive, but their application lags. The next logical step would seem to be a comprehensive and easy-to-use knowledge-based decision support (KBDS) system in a convenient format. Locally based KBDS could facilitate self-audit and provide a step towards the ideal of a ‘self-organising system’ requiring little external audit. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-11T01:09:05Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-da63675044db467990174e984d364a20 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2058-4555 2058-4563 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-11T01:09:05Z |
| publishDate | 2004-05-01 |
| publisher | BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Journal of Innovation in Health Informatics |
| spelling | doaj.art-da63675044db467990174e984d364a202022-12-22T01:26:06ZengBCS, The Chartered Institute for ITJournal of Innovation in Health Informatics2058-45552058-45632004-05-01122919610.14236/jhi.v12i2.11392Professional values and informatics: what is the connection?Peter PritchardGeneral practitioners (GPs) need to feel that they are doing a good job in providing care of high quality in a humane manner – that they are ‘good’ doctors. The General Medical Council booklet Good Medical Practice is full of imperatives, but short on values that are the determinants of behaviour. Much has been written on doctors’ professional values in the past decade, but it is not easy for individual GPs and teams to define their own values and consider to what extent they live up to them. Values and informatics, at first glance, might seem to have little in common, or even to be mutually antipathetic, and this is possible within the limitations of current technology. However, providing high-quality care involves the application of knowledge, evidence and guidelines, as well as auditing outcomes. For all these tasks, informatics provides the essential means of discovering whether we, as individuals and teams, are living up to our espoused values so that they become values-in-action that drive behaviour. Application of advanced informatics has the potential to improve and measure diagnostic and therapeutic skills. Technical advances are impressive, but their application lags. The next logical step would seem to be a comprehensive and easy-to-use knowledge-based decision support (KBDS) system in a convenient format. Locally based KBDS could facilitate self-audit and provide a step towards the ideal of a ‘self-organising system’ requiring little external audit.https://hijournal.bcs.org/index.php/jhi/article/view/113knowledge-based decision supportmedical informaticsprimary careprofessional values |
| spellingShingle | Peter Pritchard Professional values and informatics: what is the connection? Journal of Innovation in Health Informatics knowledge-based decision support medical informatics primary care professional values |
| title | Professional values and informatics: what is the connection? |
| title_full | Professional values and informatics: what is the connection? |
| title_fullStr | Professional values and informatics: what is the connection? |
| title_full_unstemmed | Professional values and informatics: what is the connection? |
| title_short | Professional values and informatics: what is the connection? |
| title_sort | professional values and informatics what is the connection |
| topic | knowledge-based decision support medical informatics primary care professional values |
| url | https://hijournal.bcs.org/index.php/jhi/article/view/113 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT peterpritchard professionalvaluesandinformaticswhatistheconnection |