Clinical teams are increasingly using WhatsApp to communicate amongst themselves but the tool is not safe in terms of data security and is ineffective in managing clinical workflow, warn Dr Harry Claireaux and colleagues
Founded in 2009, WhatsApp (Mountain View, California, US) now has over one billion users. In healthcare, WhatsApp is increasingly used to communicate within and between teams.
This unsanctioned medium offers efficiency benefits over radio frequency paging systems which rely on users finding a landline, knowing the recipient’s number, and suspending care while hoping that the recipient receives the “bleep” and calls back.
While pagers have the advantage of not relying on cellular or WiFi signal, the recipient is unaware who is bleeping, why, and how urgently. Work is interrupted, time is wasted, prioritisation is difficult, and the evidence trail remains limited.
In the UK, the NHS forbids the use of WhatsApp for transmitting information in the healthcare environment.
WhatsApp has been shown to reduce communication delays, freeing up clinicians for service delivery and training, while helping to overcome human factor challenges around hierarchies. However, WhatsApp is not a secure or effective application for managing clinical workflow.
WhatsApp use amongst clinicians represents a poorly understood ticking time bomb given current UK data protection law and NHS guidelines, with 90 per cent of clinical NHS staff using this social messaging tool daily.
The authors believe there is an unmet need for a bespoke clinical communication and workflow application, designed to retain published benefits of WhatsApp use whilst innovating in areas of weakness.
Article Source:https://www.hsj.co.uk/technology-and-innovation/clinician-use-of-whatsapp-is-a-ticking-time-bomb/7020115.article
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