Dr. Sophia Kotliar recently joined Ocean Medical Center-Hackensack Meridian Health in New Jersey as the laboratory medical director. Among Dr. Sophia Kotliar’s responsibilities is to provide complete patient care through the company’s health information systems (HIS).

HIS’s store and process data about patients’ health and medical interventions. Examples of available information range from medical histories to research influencing treatments and policies. Several applications of HIS exist:

1. Electronic medical records (EMR). Replacing paper documentation, EMR’s collect and enable the sharing of test results, remedies, and other factors. Master patient indexes link multiple records and reduce the chances of preserving contradictory data.

2. Practice management software automates many of the tasks formerly left to the service staff, such as making appointments and sending bills, Users range from solo practices to large hospitals.

3. Patient portals often permit health consumers to schedule visits online, read lab results, and review their medications.

4. Remote patient monitoring (sometimes known as telehealth) lets doctors in distant areas learn about patients’ conditions, make decisions, and retain such data for possible research.

5. Clinical decision support systems analyze health data to let doctors make better-informed diagnoses and even predict possible drug interactions.