Get ready to get digital and what it means for you

Western Sydney Local Health District (WSLHD) is about to get a digital facelift.

During the next 18 months, the Digital Health Clinical Program will be rolling out a series of essential digital upgrades for clinicians across all facilities.

The upgrades will mean improvements to the eMR, eMeds, and systems in surgery, anaesthetics and cardiology.

Facilities will also get critical updates to medical devices, which will connect machines to the eMR.

Chief medical information officer, A/Professor Naren Gunja said the Digital Health Clinical Program is critical to WSLHD’s vision for fit-for-purpose health service delivery.

“The primary goal of the Digital Health Clinical Program is to deliver a patient-centric electronic health record across all facilities in WSLHD that will improve patients, clinicians, educators and researchers access to quality information required to deliver world class healthcare,” Dr Gunja said.

The program will implement tools to provide quick, easy access to key information for clinicians.

So what are some of the many updates you can expect in the coming months?

The eMR will get a modern new look, making patient information easily viewable, as well as an emergency real time dashboard, daily scheduler, ED sepsis reports and improvements to progress notes.

eMeds will get an interface to iPharmacy, a function to check allergy and drug interaction, discharge summaries containing medications, as well as intravenous fluids and fluid balance charts.

In surgery, scheduling, requests for admission and perioperative documents will all become electronic, and there will be updated recovery observations, tracking boards and higher quality reporting.

In cardiology, there will be upgrades to reduce data duplication, and advanced image management, including the ability to view ECGs and imaging from within the eMR.

“We are improving new technology so that clinicians can focus more attention where it belongs: on helping our patients.”

To find out everything you need to know about what the Digital Health Clinical Program involves, when it’s all happening and what you should expect, come to the kick off session at your facility next week.

Details below.

Blacktown & Mt Druitt Hospitals
Where: Auditorium, Clinical School Blacktown Hospital
When: Wednesday 11th April, 12:30-1:30pm

Westmead Hospital
Where: Westmead Hospital Auditorium, WECC
When: Thursday 12th April, 1:00-2:00pm

 Auburn Hospital
When: Tuesday 17th April, 2:00-3:00pm (location TBA)