Changes in health care technology and demands from patients have prompted the University of Colorado Hospital to integrate more than 120 data programs into one database.
“Medical consumers are savvy. They want access to their information now. They don’t want to wait,” said hospital spokeswoman Erika Matich. “We can’t do much now, but we’re going to provide that soon.”
Patients transferred within the hospital — such as when they are admitted into the hospital after landing in the emergency room — currently endure a second round of questions and forms to fill out.
Information shared across the hundreds of systems now doesn’t transfer perfectly. A medicine might be called one thing in one system and something else in another.
The repetitiveness and inconsistencies will end with the $67 million project to implement the database from Epic Systems Corp., based in Wisconsin, hospital officials said.
“Health care is evolving,” said hospital president and chief executive Bruce Schroffel. “This is a real expensive endeavour, but we are fortunate enough to be able to do it.”
Though the full project won’t be complete until the summer of 2012, the first wave will launch some general-practice departments on the system by Feb. 1.
“When patients get to the second place, all information — allergies, medications — the handoff will be electronic and available immediately, where today it may require a phone call,” project director Soren Schoultz said. “There will absolutely be a lot of efficiency to be gained.”
The change also will minimize the risk of administering an incorrect drug or giving an overdose, for instance, as a result of a miscommunication.
Besides allowing for more efficient transfers within the hospital, patients also will be able to make appointments online, communicate with doctors securely and view lab results as they are completed.
“They can access their health records while they’re on vacation in Hawaii; they can use it to get a second opinion,” Schoultz said. “The benefits that come are endless.”
The labs at the hospital will not make the change to an Epic system, but optimization will allow the system in place to smoothly share information with Epic.
Agreements will be drafted in the coming year to share some information with other health care providers that use the Epic system, such as Children’s Hospital and Kaiser Permanente.
That sharing of information can create more complete medical records when patients are referred from one place to another or when they go to those different centers for second opinions, Schoultz said.
The research that has typically been a main focus for the hospital also will benefit from the new database.
“We’re not taking a step back certainly,” Schoultz said. “Everything about the care of patients will be recorded on Epic, so this will only further support that research.”
Yesenia Robles: 303-954-1372 or yrobles@denverpost.com
