Health InsuranceElectronic Records Communicate Quickly, Satisfy Patients
LifeBridge Health in Baltimore, Maryland is one of the few heath care systems with computerized records that can now be accessed across our whole system, which includes two acute hospitals, one sub-acute hospital and two nursing homes.
Some of the things that can be done now are:
Every physician, nurse and support staff member has access to one patient record. This means medical personnel can conference at the same time with the same information.
The computer system has terminals at all nursing stations in our hospitals, which permits rapid access of medical record, test results, medicine, informational databases, x-rays, and ordering (CPOE).
Nurses and technicians provide support for the house staff by taking responsibility for IVs, phlebotomy, and patient transport.
Our in-house hospital pharmacies are also computerized. We are in the process of expanding this to our other centers.
The ER doctors at Sinai Hospital and Northwest Hospital do all of their charting on line. Our emergency rooms are two of the very few that do this.
We also have a partnership with a hospital, which is not in our system, to exchange discharge information by computer.
Our long-term care centers work with an outside pharmacy to log all medicines, which can be many for the elderly. The lists can be printed out simply for clinical workers. Easy to read instructions can also be printed for family members.
Putting the system on line began several years ago, but just this year, our long-term care centers were able to access the system, with some modifications that better suit the needs of their clinical staff, patients and residents.
As an example, when a patient"s physician says she needs a mammogram, the patient can go to our mammogram center, and the X-rays are put online. That way, her primary physician and her ocologist and any other doctor can see the results. The patient never has to lug them back and forth.
In addition, our doctors put their orders online using CPOE, our nurses and pharmacy are also computerized.
LifeBridge Health in Baltimore, Maryland has four center, Sinai Hospital, Northwest Hospital, Levindale Hebrew Geriatric Center and Hospital, and Courtland Gardens Nursing & Rehabilitation Center.
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