Vanderbilt LifeFlight, Nashville, Tenn.-based Vanderbilt University Medical Center's critical air transport service, uses Epic's mobile app that lets nurses and paramedics access a patient's health records while in flight.
The mobile app, Haiku, gives authorized, clinical LifeFlight providers access to the patient's recent medical visits, medications, allergies and emergency contacts. Prior to using the app, LifeFlight providers often provided care with little-to-none of the patient's medical information.
Haiku was first introduced to hospitals in 2010 as a way for physicians to perform simple patient care tasks such as viewing lab results on the go. In 2018, the app expanded to LifeFlight services, Shane Stenner, MD, VUMC senior director of clinical informatics, said in a news release emailed to Becker's Hospital Review.
The app has also helped in providing care for more complex patients, such as elderly patients on medication or individuals with heart conditions, Lifeflight's Mike Davidson, RN, EMT, said.
"One of our crews transported a child who had a congenital heart defect, and the outlining facility only knew so much about their surgical history and what was their normal presentation," Mr. Davidson said. "With Haiku, they were able to pull up this child's chart. They were able to fine-tune and tailor their approach to that child's care based on the information that they wouldn't have had access to otherwise."