No one wants an EHR to go offline, but you can avoid panic with these simple steps.
Your electronic health record (EHR) has most certainly allowed you to streamline systems and documentation of patient records—but it can also lead to a complete breakdown in productivity if it shuts down.
Three high-profile incidents occurred this year that highlight the issues that can occur when EHRs aren’t functional. In February, Antelope Valley Hospital experienced an EHR outage that caused its entire emergency department to shut down, as the facility was unable to write prescriptions, verify doctors’ orders, review labs or see previous patient records.
Just one month later, Boston Children’s Hospital experienced a hardware problem that prompted a complete shutdown of its EHR for several days, which caused the postponement of several procedures—and forced clinicians to rely on the previous methods of paper charts and hand delivering important documents such as prescriptions that are typically sent electronically when EHRs work the way they’re supposed to.
And just last month, Hospital Corporation of America saw some of its EHRs stop operating properly, causing the impacted clinicians to have to rely on workarounds to handle its recordkeeping.
If you think this problem is isolated to large institutions, think again. The federal government’s Contingency Planning SAFER Guide warns that “EHR unavailability, which will occur in every EHR-enabled healthcare environment, represents a significant potential patient safety hazard that directly affects patient care.” Patients could suffer from medication errors, the unavailability of radiological tests, canceled procedures, and other care issues if EHRs fail to work properly.
To find out what to do if your EHR goes offline, check out the following tips from Bob Steele, executive vice president of clinical services with the HCI Group.
Create A Detailed Downtime Policy
Each department should have a downtime policy in place, but those will differ based on the sector’s workflow, operations, etc., says Steele, who has managed EHR outages during three different hurricanes. Once you establish your protocols, ensure that all staff members are aware of them and fully understand the plan—then perform annual drills to confirm that everyone can put the plan into action.
Most practices have annual meetings where they discuss changes to the EHR or new policies. During these meetings, perform a “mock downtime” practice run during which your staff members demonstrate what they would do in the event of an EHR outage. These practice sessions are of the utmost importance. “Don’t wait until an outage happens, as patient lives are at stake,” Steele advises.
The following areas are key to creating your downtime policy, which you should tailor to your office or department based on your specific needs:
1. Patient Safety is Paramount
One of your focus areas when creating your offline EHR strategy should inevitably be patient safety, since it’s critically important, and it could suffer in the absence of electronic records. Include the following aspects in your patient safety plan, Steele advises:
2. Keep Operations Moving Smoothly
Even without an EHR to rely on, you must ensure that your department operates smoothly, which means you keep track of scheduled diagnostics and treatments as well as the continuum of care for your patients, Steele says. This could encompass various areas, including the following:
3. Bills Must Remain Accurate
Losing your EHR doesn’t mean you have to lose money in billing—you should have a plan in place to ensure that you capture all of the information necessary to submit claims and bills, Steele says.
Maintain Backups
You can put systems into place that may help you get EHR access even in the event of a storm, but those aren’t foolproof, Steele says. “While generators are good and a must to have, events such as hurricanes, earthquakes and fire can knock them out as well,” he advises. “A backup, emergency supply of all paper forms should be maintained and in current form should the occasion arise to need them.”
Resource: To read more about the HCI Group’s EHR capabilities, visit www.thehcigroup.com.