Quicker approach to info gives care quality benefits

A latest study indicates health information exchange can make better emergency department care and provide care quality benefits through faster access to patient data arranged by outside healthcare agencies.

The study concentrated on Epic Systems’ Care Everywhere HIE platform to assess whether it gave more timely information access in the ED, in comparison with standard telephone- and fax-based approaches to data retrieval from outside agencies. In the study, outside information appeals were either fulfilled through Epic’s Care Everywhere or fax/scan to the electronic health record (EHR) system.

The results, issued in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, involved EHR audit log data from 2,163 sufferers seen in the ED at the institute of University of Michigan Health System from the time period of February 2014 to February 2015.

“Those were all the sufferers for whom an outside record request was made during a 1-year time period,” claims Julia Adler-Milstein, co-author of the article and assistant professor in the School of Information and School of Public Health at the University of Michigan.

In accordance to Adler-Milstein, sufferer data from outside healthcare agencies was readily present to ED staff using Epic’s Care Everywhere. She points out that the HIE platform was linked with faster outside information access for care quality benefits versus fax/scan, and faster approach was linked with more effective ED care.

“When the data came back through fax, clinicians saw the data almost an hour later than HIE,” analyzes Adler-Milstein. “The sooner the data comes in, the sooner the clinician actually sees it. When it comes back slower, the affect on care is less.”

Though there was no direct association between return of data through HIE versus fax/scan and ED results, the study results disclose that for each 1-hour reduction in access time, visit length was 52.9 minutes shorter; the likelihood of imaging was lower (by 2.5, 1.6, and 2.4% points for CT, MRI, and radiographs, respectively); the likelihood of admission was 2.4% points lower; and average costs were $1,187 lower.

“While our research concentrates on one type of HIE, Care Everywhere, it is likely that the care quality benefits from faster access to data could be realized utilizing different approaches to HIE,” summarizes the JAMIA article. “Provider agencies are hence likely to benefit from investing in forms of HIE and associated workflows that make sure that ED clinicians can view data from outside agencies in a timely manner.”