The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center is partnering with nearby fire and emergency medical services departments to upload patients' health information directly to the hospital's EHR system, Columbus Dispatch reports.
The Columbus (Ohio) Division of Fire and Grandview Heights (Ohio) Fire Department are working with Ohio State University's main hospital and University Hospital East, both in Columbus, on the data sharing system.
When one of the EMS agencies completes a patient's medical record, the data exchange system will transfer the information directly to OSU's EHR. Once EMS and the patient arrive at the hospital, the first responders will still verbally brief waiting clinicians on critical information, including the person's name, vital signs and treatments performed by the medics, according to the report.
With the new system, physicians will be able to access the patient's information in real time instead of waiting for the data to be emailed. EMS will also be able to view a patient's diagnosis after treatment, which is information that typically needs to be requested.
Columbus Division of Fire has performed numerous tests runs of the new system, which still has some issues with patient identification numbers because the hospital and EMS staffs use different codes, the division's EMS Captain Paul Bender told Columbus Dispatch. The department and OSU are working to allow scanning of the patient's ID number rather than having to type it into the system.