How can we provide better patient care using technology?
That’s the role of the Clinical Informatics (CI) team that recently centralized its operations as part of Digital Technology Services.
The Clinical Informaticists, under the direction of our Chief Medical Informatics Officer Lauren Koniaris, M.D., evaluate the efficacy and operation of clinical information systems, how the information is used and how to best improve the quality of care moving forward.
Simply put, from Epic to imaging to integrated devices, clinicians use various pieces of technology and equipment to gather, store and distribute patient information. The CI team is the conduit between Epic inpatient users, Emergency Department users, Behavioral Health Acute Care users, physician and nursing leadership and DTS. The team helps to streamline and optimize how data is acquired, structured, stored, processed, retrieved, analyzed, presented, and communicated.
How is the CI team working to deliver the highest quality patient care, agile data analytics, and cutting-edge research?
- Meeting clinicians where they are by ensuring all sites have Clinical Informatics coverage and support.
- Rounding - monthly visits scheduled across all hospital campuses.
- Guiding clinicians in the implementation of novel technologies.
- Participating in any new workflow planning to assist with technology translations and mitigate associated clinical challenges.
- Providing in-person support during system go lives and for regulatory visits.
- Advising on optimal system use to facilitate improved quality outcomes.
The CI team in collaboration with clinicians have already partnered to:
- Remove 230,000 interruptive alerts/week or approximately 1,500 person hours saved per month across the network’s clinical disciplines.
- Serve as workflow experts and liaisons to optimize EMR clinical adoption and minimize disruptions in patient care during the Carrier Clinic Epic Go Live.
- Assess and Validate 193 Business Continuity Application Machines to improve downtime readiness and minimize operational impact of downtime.
- Implement Clinical E consent process at Hackensack University Medical Center to reduce manual error and regulatory vulnerability.
- Redesign the Universal Transfer Form to reduce regulatory vulnerability and improve overall end user experience when completing the form.
What’s next? The CI team has launched Dump the Junk, a program designed to streamline clinician documentation, optimize documentation tools in the EMR and most importantly, reduce time spent in the EMR in order to increase time at bedside. To offer suggestions, click here.
To learn more, email: dgclinicalinformatics@hmhn.org.