Canterbury transfers one million patient records to SI PICS

Canterbury transfers one million patient records to SI PICS

Date:12 October 2018

More than one million patient records have been transferred to Canterbury DHB’s new patient management and administration system, the South Island Patient Information Care System.

SI PICS went live across CDHB on 6 October.

Provided by Orion Health, it will eventually become the region-wide solution for patient management and administration across the South Island’s five district health boards.

The system went live at Nelson Marlborough DHB in May 2018. West Coast and South Canterbury DHBs will implement it in 2019, followed by Southern DHB, with all due to be live in 2020.

SI PICS works in conjunction with the existing South Island-wide clinical portal, Health Connect South, and provides a significant step towards fully integrated electronic patient records in the region.

The system includes patient demographics, master patient index, appointment booking, waiting list management, patient transfers, records of patient activity, reporting, admission and discharges, and alerts and allergies.

CDHB chief digital officer Stella Ward says the introduction of SI PICS means patients will experience more streamlined care wherever their health journey takes them.

“All vital information related to a person’s community and hospital care is recorded in a standardised and secure way,” she says.

“From a patient’s perspective, duplication and constantly having to explain themselves and repeat their story to every health professional will be a thing of the past.”

Ward says having a single regional system also makes it easier for health professionals moving between DHBs.

Health planning will be improved as SI PICS can provide regional data to enable comparison between services and across the South Island. It helps measure and monitor how each DHB is tracking with its elective services performance and the length of time a patient spends in hospital.

SI PICS has been in use at Burwood Hospital since 2016 and went live at six rural health facilities across Canterbury earlier this year. It replaces three outdated software programmes in Canterbury.

Ward says that like all large-scale information system changes, there have been some challenges bedding in the new way of working.

“Our project team is now hard at work and focused on addressing user support workflows and data quality, to better support the ongoing integration of SI PICS into our health system,” she says.

“The collaborative approach to the system’s roll-out across the region is a great example of DHBs working together to make the best use of the resources available to them.”

URL: https://www.hinz.org.nz/news/426421/Canterbury-transfers-one-million-patient-records-to-SI-PICS.htm

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