Health Imaging & IT - March 2008 - (Page 15)

raditional systems to communicate and manage critical results are full of flaws. There is the manual phone call approach, but phones aren’t always answered or the wrong person might answer the phone. In many hospitals, contact information changes on a regular basis, and radiology departments may not have the correct information. Faxes can be equally problematic as the receiving machine might be off or out of paper. And once communicated, the right person might not receive the fax right away. Unfortunately, it’s not unheard of for it to take days for a radiologist to track the correct physician for results communication. The problem takes its toll in a number of ways. For starters, hospitals must wrangle with legal and regulatory challenges. “Miscommunication of findings is a causative factor in 85 percent of radiology lawsuits,” reports Tom White, founder of Veriphy. And The Joint Commission (JC) set national patient safety as one of its top goals and requires hospitals to improve processes. The flip side of the coin is productivity. Every day, radiologists, cardiologists and lab techs make two to three million calls to communicate test results, which can gobble an hour out of the work day for some highly paid specialists. CTRM systems present a new paradigm. They tap into IT to streamline and automate the results communication process. Solutions not only improve patient safety, but also increase productivity among radiologists and other specialists. It’s a match made in heaven. Here’s how CTRM works. The CTRM/workflow equation One option in the CTRM market is Amicas’ RadStream workflow engine. Developed by the radiology department at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital in Ohio, RadStream is designed to address two key issues in radiology: improving critical results notification HealthImaging.com “Anything less than human intervention can and reducing interruptions to workflow. lead to suboptimal patient care,” he continThe system meets its objectives, says Mark ues. Consider a recent case in which an operHalsted, MD, RadStream project leader and ator insisted that a nurse physically bring a chief of the Radiology Informatics Research physician to the phone for a report of a misCore at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. placed line that required immediate attenA pre- and post-implementation analysis tion. “An automated system or an overburconducted by the College of Business at dened radiologist might not have approached University of Cincinnati showed that Cinthe situation with the same diligence, which cinnati Children’s Hospital radiologists could have led to a different result for the conveyed and documented results in 5 perpatient,” notes Halsted. The other major cent of cases prior to RadStream. After deployment, notification and documentation jumped by an additional 15 percent without worsening workflow or increasing turnaround time. The system works by removing the burden of communication from radiologists, and instead, placing responsibility for communication on human operators. RadStream covers a number of common scenarios. If a referring physician orders a STAT study, RadStream automatically routes the [ The RadStream workflow engine from amicas has boosted results to a bank of operators via the notification and documentation by 15 percent at Cincinnati Children’s internet. The first available operator Hospital, where it was developed, without impacting workflow or turnaround time. ] opens the case and communicates the benefit associated with RadStream is effiimpression or full report to the ordering ciency; since deploying RadStream, radiolophysician via the phone. The process difgy report turnaround time plummeted by 50 fers slightly for any case with a critical findpercent at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. ing. When a radiologist detects a critical Another RadStream user, St. Mary’s Hosfinding, he or she can instant message an pital in Athens, Ohio, turned to the workflow operator within the RadStream system. engine because radiologists felt they needed a The operator phones the referring physisystem to document results communication. cian to bring him or her up to speed before In the last few years, several referring physiconnecting the radiologist and clinician. A cians had claimed in lawsuits they hadn’t final option covers cases where the referreceived results. Workflow was another chalring physician may miss a finding such as a lenge, says PACS Administrator Brian Dunsubtle pneumonia in an ED patient. In can, as radiologists complained about spendthese cases, the radiologist routes the dictaing too much time trying to locate physition to the operator, who, in turn, ensures cians. RadStream provides a perfect fit. It that that clinician reads the report. In all removes the burden of communication from cases, the operator documents the connecradiologists without changing the way they tion in a permanent record. work. The radiologist simply marks a study “Human interaction is key to the success as critical, and file room clerks who monitor of critical test results management,” asserts the worklist communicate the results to the Halsted. Cincinnati Children’s Hospital taps appropriate physician. The system also into file room workers, transcriptionists and records communication to provide a permaradiology extenders to monitor RadStream nent record of results communication. web interfaces and connect with physicians. March 2008 | Health Imaging & IT 15 http://HealthImaging.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Health Imaging & IT - March 2008

Health Imaging & IT - March 2008 Table of Contents On the Web The Enterprise: Communicating Better News Update Critical Test Results Management: The Human Touch The Changing Face of the Cath Lab Cardiovascular CT: A Clinical Boon Cardiology PACS: Solutions to Fit Your Needs ACC 08: Building Quality & Value Together Picking the Perfect PACS Displays PET/CT: A Game-Changer in Cancer Patient Management DR: You Gotta Have IT – Delivering Speed, Efficiency, Savings Laser Imagers: Answering the Call for Hard Copy Reader's Resources Stat Sheet

Health Imaging & IT - March 2008

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