Imminent Improvements

Now that we've settled into the unified view of CIS (note the intentional avoidance of the word "enhanced"), the informatics team is able to circle back and make some changes to the interface that ought to improve your experience. First on the list is the rearrangement of the Table of Contents (or Menu) bands. These changes will be based on position (ambulatory-, ED- or hospital-based). Without going into too much detail, we will move the Documentation and Clinical Notes higher up the list and give lab results its own band to save you a few clicks. For ED docs and those who spend most or even part of their time in the hospital, the default opening page will be Orders rather than the Overview page. For ambulatory-based docs, you will see the removal of hospital-oriented entries like Med Rec and MAR Summary. Expect these changes to be evident in the next week or two.

We are also actively seeking a results to endorse solution that will enable a system-wide rollout towards the end of the summer. In order to make this happen smoothly, we are creating pools, (think "group proxies"), that will facilitate custom workflow design in every practice. While the usual routine in a primary care setting is for doctors to review results and communicate with patients accordingly, others choose to delegate this review and be made aware of abnormal results. My first thought is to create a results pool for each of the BMP practices. Pools will be posted at the same time that RTE will arrive in the clinician's Message Center inbox. A result can be reviewed and endorsed by the physician and will then drop off both their list as well as the pool's list. In the event that the protocol is for the medical assistant to endorse normal labs, then those results will also fall off the pool list as well as the ordering clinician's results list. It will be the responsibility of the practice to determine the proper protocol so as to avoid inadvertant endorsement of results that go unseen by the ordering clinician.

Other improvements:

We continue to work with Cerner to optimize the function of the Prescription Writer. If you haven't heard, two key points are to 1) Cancel/Reorder any meds that were last written with EasyScript. Thereafter, the Renew function will work well; and 2) when in doubt, fill in the Duration field. This will facilitate the easy completion of the Rx. Remember to click on the big downward yellow arrow found in the middle divider bar if you are unsure of what field needs completion to execute a script.

Med Rec is still in a tough spot, though we expect it to improve over the next few months.

We have a new Health Maintenance Redesign working group. The plan is to review current guidelines and bring the HM tool in line with the evidence and recommendations of sentinel task forces.