Friday 6 October at noon ChipSoft made history with the four hospitals of 'Zorg op Zuid'. As of that day the data of their almost three million patients are kept in a single Electronic Healthcare Record: HiX by ChipSoft.
The multitenant solution HiX serves 20 different healthcare locations across four hospitals (Van Weel Bethesda Hospital, Ikazia Hospital, Maasstad Hospital and Spijkenisse Medical Centre). They now use one database and one management organisation, which provides numerous advantages for both the healthcare institutes and their patients. Chairman of the board of directors of Maasstad Hospital and chairman of the regional steering group Peter Langenbach proudly states "over 7,200 employees from four autonomous hospitals each with their own culture have worked together intensively for a year and a half and the result is a single shared EHR. With this we can provide our patients with even better care."
Improving patient care together
A single EHR for cooperating institutions means increased efficiency and patient safety by having important data and test results available at all four hospitals to all relevant practitioners. “With increasing frequency patients are treated for complex conditions in multiple hospitals [within the organisation of 'Zorg op Zuid']. With the patient’s permission the single EHR provides the physicians and nurses involved with all important information. This adds to the quality of care and to patient safety” says Koos Moerland, director of Van Weel Bethesda Hospital. Paul van der Velden, director of Spijkenisse Medical Centre adds: “Patients no longer have to answer the same questions about personal data, medication or allergies multiple times. Examinations like blood tests and ultrasounds only need to be performed at one hospital. As a result treatments are quicker. The EHR even offers future possibilities to cooperate with general practitioners, chemists and laboratories.“
Full support
HiX integrally supports almost every unit and healthcare professional in all 20 locations. Paul continues: “[The system] currently contains 30 million consultations with patients, 113 million lab appointments, 1.2 million pathology examinations, around 2.5 million admissions and over 8 million radiology reports, in addition to 200 established interfaces to various component systems.”
Privacy
Rob Kievit, General Director of Ikazia Hospital emphasises that patient privacy always had top priority while transitioning to a single medical record and it still does. “Only with the patient’s express permission will their information be available to all cooperating practitioners, regardless the hospital location.”