The ECM system also makes it possible to convert paper-based workflows into more efficient electronic ones. “The ECM system has allowed us to give these institutions a view of our data that we would never have been able to with paper medical charts.” And, we need to be able to share the information within our records with these health services,” Carroll explained. “There are four health services very close to our hospital. In addition to supporting point-of-care decisions, this electronic information provides clinicians with the ability to share clinical information with other health care providers. Perhaps most importantly, by providing access to patient-centric information through a web-based viewer that is available at the point of care, the ECM is making it possible for clinicians to easily leverage “clinical information when and where they need it,” according to Carroll. And, while it might not provide what an EMR offers, Royal Melbourne is already realising a variety of benefits from the ECM.Ĭlinicians, for instance, have access to a comprehensive view of previously scanned records episode and coded information such as alerts and allergies from the patient administration system result sets acquired from pathology, radiology, and a variety of other clinical systems forms captured from faxes and emails and information extracted directly from other databases. With the ECM in place, the hospital has created a foundation where “medical record content, from paper and an array of other media, is digitised and managed efficiently into a system that is capable of informing decision-making and improving workflows,” Carroll pointed out. At that point, all clinical record documentation related to patient activity, including admitted episodes and non-admitted attendances had been scanned into the patient’s ECM clinical record. The ECM solution was implemented across Melbourne Health and became the primary clinical record for completed patient activity in November of 2015. With such a system in place, all content-incoming or outgoing-is funneled, cataloged, and stored in a centralised repository, irrespective of source device, location, or type of content.įollowing funding approval and a review of ECM solutions from various vendors, the Hyland OnBase solution was selected in May 2015. Hospital leaders, however, realised that they could overcome some of the challenges associated with information sprawl by adopting an enterprise content management (ECM) system to integrate, manage, and organise electronic information sourced from various databases and IT systems. This had a negative effect on patient care because clinicians didn’t know what others were doing. Unfortunately, the hoarding caused information to be tucked away in drawers and filing cabinets and remain shared. People would create stockpiles because they didn’t know if they would get the records back,” said Carroll. So, if a clinician or staff member got their hands on a record, they would try to keep it rather than return it to the department. We had created a culture of records hoarding. “We would get complaints because we could not find paper records. With these dispersed electronic databases, it was often difficult to locate and leverage needed information. “And, we were struggling to share the information.” But we were still relying on staff members to actually print items out to get them into the medical records,” said Rhonda Carroll, former Director of Information and Performance at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. “Information was sitting in all these various clinical documentation systems. The problem: These systems all stood alone in silos, incapable of communicating with one another. In an effort to eliminate paper, various departments had implemented electronic clinical databases. While the cancer centre provided additional motivation, the hospital had already been on the path toward digitalisation for a few years. Even without the EMR funding, the organisation could strive to eliminate paper, connect standalone electronic clinical databases, and position the hospital to be ready to move to an EMR in the future. Instead, they decided to keep their digital journey moving forward. Leaders, however, did not let this setback deflate their efforts. Unfortunately, the Victorian government did not fund the EMR initiative at the time.
0 kommentar(er)
