By Cecilia Nasmith
Haliburton Kawartha Pine Ridge District Health Unit Health Information Systems Specialist Francine Fernandes reported on the roll-out of their new Collaborative Health Records system at the board's May meeting.
The program is provided by Input Health and gives clients the ability to potentially book their appointments on-line for services such as sexual health, clinics, vaccines, family-health clinics, breast-feeding clinics, Fernandes said.
It gives the health unit the ability to provide prescriptions and referrals, “and also the ability to have virtual appointments with clients through CHR.
“It's very futuristic for the health unit. This is very, very exciting and I am very happy to be part of bringing CHR to all the departments in the health unit.”
They had been using another model called EMR in sexual health services, but it crashed in March last year, “just in time for COVID-19.”
That's how the decision was made to implement it first to start a COVID-19 call centre, and Click & Connect was launched on their website. Users were taken to a page with frequently asked question and, if that didn't answer their concerns, they were invited to submit their own question. The answer would come later with a call to that person.
It started March 9, with 176 calls. By April, a daily total of 600 was not uncommon, and they went well over 900 some days – peaks that could usually be traced to a provincial announcement or community outbreak.
Now all incoming calls are input into the CHR platform. By the end of the month, services related to infectious diseases will be on the platform, followed a month later by family health.
“This is a really good example of using technology to ease the workload, when you look at 900 calls a day, that may have had to be answered by actual people.” chair Doug Elmslie said.
Elmslie asked if there was a larger application that might link the CHR system to doctors or hospitals.
Director of Health Promotion Pam Stuckless said that Input Health has just been acquired by Telus Health, who have a number of electric record platforms from other health-care providers so that may be a possibility at some future time.
