Patients' records at Hillingdon Hospital could all be accessed at the touch of a button... through a mobile phone app.
The systems development team at Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has developed an innovative new mobile app for phones and tablet devices, called The Hillingdon Care Record (HCR).
The app is already being used by a wide range of clinicians, across many speciality services and roles.
The HCR app collects patient information from multiple systems and presents it to clinicians in one central, easy to use mobile health care record.
It means hospital workers can tap into discharge summary letters from inpatient and emergency care (A&E), outpatient attendance letters and other diagnostic letters.
The app allows the data to be accessed securely with built-in hardware encryption reinforced with a passcode.
Clinicians now have full visibility
Dr Suraj Dabhi, a foundation doctor at the trust, said: ”The HCR application is an invaluable tool and has revolutionised our assessment of patients, allowing us to access relevant information relating to our patients, all from one platform.
“It’s proved most useful when assessing new patients that have come into hospital.
Before the introduction of the Hillingdon Care Record, staff at the trust used a number of separate IT systems which could only be accessed through desktop PCs.
With The Hillingdon Care Record app clinicians now have full visibility of a patient’s historic clinical correspondence, together with any pathology results or radiology reports - all in a single mobile platform, accessible at the patient’s bedside.
Dr Dabhi added: “We are able to view previous clinic letters, diagnostics and discharge summaries of patients, allowing us to get a full picture of a patient’s medical history.”
Benefit for emergency care
Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust is also the first trust in the UK to incorporate the ‘Coordinate My Care’ (CMC) alerts into a central health care record which notifies clinicians of any care plans that patients may have in place.
Previously, this was a manual process where alerts had to be kept up to date by email.
Now, clinicians are alerted to whether a patient has a pre-existing care plan as part of their care record through The Hillingdon Care Record app.
Emergency care services and patients at Hillingdon Hospitals NHS FT are also benefiting from the introduction of the app.
Emergency care staff can now instantly see GP information for the patient, such as current medications, allergies, long-term care conditions and much more.
