However, if the cost issues are set aside for a moment, eHealth is making some strides in improving health care. One example is a medical record-sharing system being implemented throughout the South West Local Health Improvement Network.
SPIRE -- for Southwest Physician Interface to Regional Electronic Medical Record -- sends digital files of hospital-generated lab results, diagnostic images and transcribed reports directly to a patient's family doctor to be entered automatically in patients' files.
Speed and accuracy are the main benefits. SPIRE saves the doctors' offices from re-entering the records from faxed documents. Turnaround time in the paper system could take weeks.
"This is one of the success stories, I think," said Dr. Sean Blaine, whose STAR Family Health Team was the pilot site in Huron-Perth for SPIRE.
Before being linked to SPIRE, the office scanned the faxes to convert to electronic files. The optical readers weren't perfect, for example, they could mistake "rn" as an "m".
"The quality of our medical records is far superior than they used to be with paper charts," Blaine said.
Chances of a drug error are reduced and communication with specialists is improved, he said. All the information needed to refer a patient to a specialist is now a keystroke away.
"It's ridiculous when you think of the fact that most information these days is {mospagebreak}generated electronically, and to have to be a situation when you go from an electronic format to a paper format back to an electronic format is insanity," Blaine said.
Across the South West LHIN, which covers an area stretching from Tobermory to Port Stanley, including Perth and Huron counties, there are about 300 doctors connected through SPIRE so far.
John Brennan, director information technology for the HPHA and Alexandra Marine and General Hospital in Goderich, said his team has connected 45 doctors so far in Perth-Huron, with roughly 20 to 25 to go over the next several weeks.
"The feedback has been really good," Brennan said.
However, there are limitations. SPIRE won't work for doctors who practise in communities where there is no high-speed Internet.
And for now, local doctors still receive reports from diagnostic tests and consultations from London hospitals by fax.
"It's a challenge that we need to address," Michael Barrett, chief executive of the South West LHIN.
There are as many as 17 different electronic record-keeping software systems used by Ontario doctors. Hospitals are also on different systems, for example, the HPHA and the London Health Sciences Centre family of hospitals don't use common software.
Barrett said the key is finding "interoperability" of different operating systems through a neutral viewer.
Cost is another factor.
Blaine said STAR spent tens of thousands of dollars on computer hardware and software, although a provincial grant for about $26,000 helped defray the expense.
Doctors whose offices are less technologically advanced are the next target for Brennan's team.
"We're hoping to build a model that will also accommodate them, so they can use a secure connection to retrieve their reports as an encrypted PDF (portable document file)," Brennan said.
To date, the South West LHIN has been given $1.2 million by eHealth Ontario for SPIRE. Of that, $205,000 went toward the work in Perth-Huron.
"EHealth Ontario, which has provided a good chunk of the funding for us to do this, they are very interested in seeing how this can be replicated in other parts of the province," Barrett said.
Local eHealth measures were cited in Stratford's being named among the Top Seven Intelligent Communities of the Year by the New York-based Intelligent Community Forum this week.
Broadband and information technology are helping address the challenges of rural health care, the ICF said in a release, with 80% of Stratford's family physicians on a broadband eHealth portal for health records, administration and after-hours care, something that has helped ease the region's shortage of family practitioners.
"I think the biggest change that people will see in the health-care system in the future will be tied to initiatives tied to eHealth," Barrett said.
Funding is key, but so is support from doctors and other health professionals.
"It's not about the technology, it's about improving the patient experience or patient quality or patient safety," Barrett said.
---
Autor(en)/Author(s): Brian Shypula
Quelle/Source: The Beacon Herald, 22.01.2011
Bitte besuchen Sie/Please visit:
