As part of the continued implementation of HCS clinical applications, an acute care facility is enhancing their use of critical pathways by installing patient care documentation. The organization went live with the meal acceptance tracking, patient education, patient profile, and intake & output tracking systems. With persistence by the facility's Outcomes & Applications Specialist, a crew of dedicated training staff, and the involvement of an excellent clinical staff, the implementation went very smoothly. The meal acceptance, patient education, patient profile, and intake & output tracking systems will now compliment the HCS Critical Pathways and Vital Signs Systems, which the facility went live with a year prior.

What exactly are these systems? They are four of the numerous components that make up the HCS Patient Care Documentation System. Meal acceptance tracking allows the facility to track a patient's acceptance of a meal on a day-to-day basis. A grid displays for the caregiver, that is broken down by six categories: breakfast, AM snack, lunch, PM snack, dinner, and HS snack. The caregiver can indicate the type of meal served, based upon a user-defined table, and record the acceptance percentage of the meal. This information becomes part of the clinical record.

Patient education allows a facility to track the education that a patient has received based on his or her condition and treatment. The system allows for customization of education handouts to each patient's specific needs. The educational material can be printed for the patient and saved on the patient's record.

The patient profile system provides information regarding a patient's condition and specific needs. This system is a communication tool between departments to ensure that the appropriate information is available for safe and efficient patient care.

Intake & output recording allows the tracking of a patient's total intake of fluids by date and shift along with the patient's total output. The patient's total cc's are calculated and displayed for the last 8 and 24 hours. This allows the caregiver to easily view and evaluate a patient's status regarding this clinical area.

In the future, the organization will implement the HCS medication administration record and the clinical assessment modules, further advancing their evolution to a complete electronic medical record. The phased approach towards implementation chosen by this facility allows the clinicians to become familiar with the system at their own pace and insures the systems success.