Steven Frisch, M.D., Executive Vice President and Hospital Systems General Director, Answers Questions About the Role of Computers in the Delivery of High Quality Care
 |
| Steven Frisch, M.D. Executive Vice President and Hospital Systems General Director |
Essentially, this is an automated record-keeping system that will improve workflow as well as patient outcomes, and will continuously evolve our electronic health record. For instance, when an MRI or blood test is ordered, doctors and other clinicians at the Medical Center can now view the image or test results on the computer, rather than waiting for an X-ray to be delivered or going to a patient's chart to check on blood test results. In the future, these systems will become central to clinician documentation, replacing unstructured handwritten notes and offering intelligence to support the health care provider. This may be in the form of presenting the most critical information to the caregiver as it becomes available versus the health care provider having to look for it.
What technology are we using to accomplish this?
Albany Med has invested in several clinical systems including Soarian Clinicals, a product of Siemens, as well as Philips/Stentor's PACS (Picture Archiving Communications System) and Cerner/Bridge Medical's barcode-supported bedside medication administration solution. These systems allow clinicians to receive and access data from many sources and use that data for clinical and financial decision-making.
How will this improve patient safety?
Automated systems allow us to standardize the way we deliver care and how we document critical information. These systems allow for real time monitoring, thereby improving quality, by reducing such things as allergic drug reactions, drug interactions, and medication errors. These systems also help decrease costs by, for instance, making us knowledgeable of less expensive drug alternatives such as an oral medication that will work in place of an intravenous drug with the same or better clinical outcome. They can even shorten length of stay by providing treatment prompts and stop medication alerts consistent with evidence-based care protocols.
Does this mean that patient charts will someday be a thing of the past?
Not necessarily. There will probably always be a need for written information to be a part of the health record. In the next several years though, the written charts will be considerably smaller. Instead, a health care provider will be more likely use a laptop or desktop to access information about his or her patient.
