Bshs 375 - Interoperability Paper

Interoperability Paper

Amber Watson

BSHS/375

June 10, 2014

Phillip Cuaresma

Interoperability Paper

There are many different types of mental health providers in the human services field. Different services are provided by different providers such as; social workers mainly deal with case management, inpatient discharge, and placement services. Psychologists mainly deal psychological testing, evaluation, and treatment of emotional/behavioral/mental problems and disorders (National Alliance on Mental Illness, 1996).  There are many more services provided by mental health providers.

        The different methods of interoperability are syntactic, semantic, and cross-domain interoperability. Syntactic Interoperability is when two or more systems are capable of communicating and exchanging data. Semantic Interoperability is when more than just two computer systems exchange information meaningfully and accurately in order to produce useful results. Cross-Domain Interoperability is multiple social, organizational, and political entities working together for a common interest (The Health IT (1990) website).

        When applying the three different methods of interoperability to mental health providers and services that they provide there are a few positives and negatives. The positive aspects and outcomes for Syntactic Interoperability are that mental health care professionals can share patient records easily and more efficiently. Also mental health providers would be to fill prescriptions faster for the patient and the provider. The negative aspect is if someone hacked the system and stole the patient’s information or filled prescriptions under the patients name for them. When applying Semantic Interoperability this could be positive in the sense that if mental health providers need accurate test results in a timely manner, this can be helpful. At the same time this is helpful, this can also cause problems for the provider by not being effective answers. And if the results are too rushed this can cause misdiagnosis. When applying Cross-Domain Interoperability can be positive when all the organizations and people related to mental health providers work together. Such as the government and state working together on providing the patients with better mental health care. And also working with the providers to provide these patients with mental help they may need.