iRefer (Cardiac)

Description

iRefer (Cardiac) is a web-based referral management system to help Cardiac Centres efficiently manage their inter-hospital referrals. Referrers and Cardiac Centre co-ordinators can easily access and update all the required information for interventional or surgical referrals in one system. The referrer logs in, and can quickly refer a new patient onto the system for the Cardiac Centre’s attention. The Unit can then view the referral’s progress and add further information without needing to contact the Cardiac Centre. The co-ordinator can immediately view the referral request, prioritise it for assessment, and if accepted, subsequently update the record during the patient’s progress to treatment and discharge.

Features

• Electronic whiteboard of referred patients and their status.
• Handles different types of referrals: Interventional and Surgical
• Handles referral priorities: Emergency, Urgent, Priority and Elective.
• Configurable email alerts to Referring Units on Patient status change.
• Shows queue order of patients for assessment and transfer.
• Configurable mandatory fields on referral forms.
• PDF and other format outcome reports may be attached to the referral for reference.
• SQL Server database store for robustness and reliability.
• Audit tables on all data to record when and who changed referral data.
• User configurable reports with Microsoft Reporting Services.
• Bespoke interfaces available for data import from Patient Administration Systems or Test Result systems.

Data Collection Screens

iRefer (Cardiac) has a simple-to-use web-based interface to review, add and update patient data. The following screens are used to manage the patient referrals:

Referral Whiteboard

The Whiteboard shows the list of current referred patients and their statuses. There are two lists, one for Interventional Referrals and the second for Surgical Referrrals. The Centre co-ordinator can view all the patients that have been referred that have not yet completed their referral. The Referring Unit can only view a list of their referred patients. The patient status is displayed by colour next to the patient entry. The full list of Patient Status is:

• Awaiting Assessment
• Referral
• Refused
• Pending
• Awaiting Transfer
• In-patient
• Completed
• Withdrawn
• Referrer Error

Highlighting a patient in one of the lists displays some more details of the patient. Click the View button to retrieve the Referral record for that patient. Note that patients with the Completed, Withdrawn, or Referrer Error statuses do not appear on the Whiteboard. The Refused status appears for a configurable period defaulted to seven days from the refusal date.
Whiteboard screenshot

Interventional/Urgent Referral Details

The Interventional Referral screen is used by the Referring Unit to refer a patient for an Interventional procedure to the Cardiac Centre. The screen is in two parts. The first part is the for the referrer to fill in. The second part may only be filled in by Cardiac Centre staff. Additionally only Centre staff can update the Patient Status at the top of the page. Whenever the Status is updated, an optional email alert can be sent out by the system to the Referring Unit to indicate the status change. All mandatory fields to be filled in have higlighted labels, and a prompt will display if any such fields are not completed when trying to save the referral record. However clicking the Urgent referral checkbox reduces the number of mandatory fields required to be filled in.
Interventional/Urgent Referral screenshot

Surgical Referral Details

The Surgical Referral screen is used to refer a patient for Surgery at the Cardiac Centre by a Referring Unit. The referrer fills in the approporiate information, taking care to ensure all mandatory data is entered. As with the Interventional Referral screen, there is a section for the Centre Co-ordinator only to enter audit information and any Outcome documents in PDF format.
Surgical Referral screenshot

Administration Screens

Administration screens are prodived to manage the system. The following tasks can be undertaken by the System Administrator:

• User Management (Add a user and assign a Referring Unit).
• Data List Management (Update lookup lists in the system).
• Referring Unit Management (Add and update Referring Unit details).
• Email Templates Management (Update email templates sent out to Referring Units with Patient status changes).

Data Analysis/Reporting

iRefer (Cardiac) provides system reports through Microsoft's Reporting Services application. Additionally an ODBC database interface is provided, so that analysis and reporting applications such as Microsoft Excel, SPSS and Microsoft Access can be used to analyse and report on data. Access is secured to reports website where only authorised users can view and run reports.

Benefits

With this system in place, both the Referring Unit and Cardiac Centre have access to the most up-to-date referral information and can spend more time managing their patients’ treatments. This will provide a faster and more efficient service. The co-ordinator will have an electronic system that gives an overview of referral flow. On a day-to-day basis, the co-ordinator can concentrate on areas where a referral’s progress has stalled (e.g. scan results not available). On a strategic level, reports produced by the system can be analysed to identify factors which may shorten referral times and improve the service. The referrer can confirm the referral and provide an estimated treatment date to the patient. The Referring Unit can also view the Cardiac Centre’s discharge notes, which may be assessed, and appropriate care information passed back to the patient.

Testimonial

The Trent Cardiology Centre in Nottingham serves patient referrals in the East Midlands and has been using iRefer (Cardiac) since August 2007. The co-ordinator, Patricia Ellis says,

"We have found using the electronic referral system extremely easy and exceptionally helpful. It has reduced the number of times I am bleeped to less than once a day from over four times daily. The referring centres like to use it as they can see where their patients are on the list and give them an approximate date for their procedure."

Online Demonstration

Try the online demo of iRefer (Cardiac). Login as either a Referrer or a Co-ordinator.

For More Information...

Please email enquiries@icraft.co.uk , use our online support form or telephone +44 (0)845 877 0010 if you are interested in finding out more about iRefer (Cardiac) and how it could be used in your organisation. We are happy to answer your queries.