news Telstra Health has announced it has deployed an electronic medical record (EMR) platform at St John of God Midland public and private hospitals in Perth.
The deployment at Australia’s newest hospitals in the Perth suburb of Midland will ensure that their digital health solutions match the “state-of-the-art facilities and staff”, Telstra Health said in a statement.
The EMR platform will form the clinical “digital backbone” of the $360-million facility, which includes a 307-bed public hospital and a 60-bed private hospital on the same campus, which has replaced the Swan District Hospital.
Russel Duncan, Managing Director of Telstra Health’s Emerging Systems, said that the solution was a fully integrated electronic medical record, meeting all the needs of both the public and private hospital environment.
“Patient’s clinical data at the St John of God Midland Public and Private Hospitals will integrate seamlessly with the hospital’s Patient Administration System, the national myHealth Record system and eventually the Western Australia Health Department, helping build a more connected health system and improve productivity and clinical care,” Duncan said.
Kevin Taylor, St John of God Health Care Group Director of Corporate Services, said that the Telstra Health solution was selected after a comprehensive selection process that rewarded the ability to have data highly available in an interoperable environment.
“We have a very clear expectation that the emerging solution will lead to efficiency and accountability and will be a major system which will enable us to interconnect with the Western Australian Government’s health services through expedient data sharing,” Taylor said.
He said that the strengths of the Telstra Health system are that it is built for Australian conditions, makes it easier for staff to do their job, delivers enhanced clinical care and patient outcomes, and is affordable and sustainable.
“By choosing an Australian EMR platform we can deliver better continuity of care for patients,” Taylor said. “A unique factor is the way we can easily notify general practitioners when one of their patients is admitted, when they are discharged and deliver a secure discharge summary of what treatment and condition they have been seen for. The doctors we have spoken to are very pleased with this integration.”
The product also tracks important patient information, he explained, such as allergies or the propensity for falls. This should ultimately assist patient care by raising alerts and signalling the need for preventative actions.
Telstra Health is a business division of Telstra Corporation, an Australian telecommunications company. The division provides eHealth solutions with the aim of creating a better health system for patients, providers and health insurers, the firm says.