EKORA®: Beyond Cardiology at NHS Tayside
Whilst EKORA was designed by practicing Cardiologists for busy Cardiology departments, the functionality goes much further than this. This is particularly evident in its use across NHS Tayside, an NHS Health Board serving 8% of the Scottish population including the cities of Perth and Dundee.
Initial development
When Dr Dougie Elder and Dr Alan Robertson developed EKORA® in 2016 it was to support their Cardiology colleagues grappling with issues such as increased waiting lists, shortages of experienced staff, increased home monitoring workloads and growing administrative burdens particularly because of paper-based systems.
EKORA® solves the problems clinicians within Cardiology departments face day to day and provides a secure, intuitive and holistic platform that provides real time patient care, provides immediate patient and department insights, and eradicates inefficiencies and errors caused by paper-based or outdated systems.
Beyond Cardiology
Whilst EKORA® was designed for Cardiology departments with modules such as Devices, Cath Lab, EP Reporting, Heart Failure and Cardiac Rehab, during the COVID-19 pandemic the team at EKORA® was approached by colleagues working in the COVID wards at NHS Tayside to see if they could reduce the reliance on paper records and provide a robust electronic patient record system.
The EKORA® EPR module was developed in April 2020 and initially used within the COVID wards. Staff there quickly recognised the benefits over existing paper records and asked for it to be rolled out further to non-COVID wards. This was initially in the medical wards in Perth Royal Infirmary, before rolling out further to at first other medical and then surgical wards across the Health Board and fully replaces what was once a completely paper system. It also integrates with data feeds from TrakCare by InterSystems® that is used extensively across Scotland to manage the location of patients within hospitals and outpatient appointments.
More recently EKORA® has also integrated with Miya Observations by Alcidion (previously Patientrack) to provide patient observations within the EKORA® EPR module. It also integrates with with national SCI Store and a number of other systems such as echocardiography reporting and lung function tests.
Additional cross-department modules
As well as EPR module, EKORA® has developed an Operation Notes module that is now used in NHS Tayside, capturing information such as the surgeon and anaesthetist, location, what anaesthetic and antibiotics, complications, implants, blood products etc, replacing previously dictated notes which needed to be typed up by administrative personnel into Word documents and filed in case files. With EKORA® Operation Notes data is immediately available and also electronically stored in a format that allows for easy audit and quality improvement via the Reporting module.
EKORA® MDT, whist being a module that comes as standard for Cardiology departments, is also able to be used in other departments. NHS Tayside currently use the MDT module within EKORA® for Cardiology, Melanoma, Diabetes, Gynaecology, Respiratory and Stroke with sub-categories for each department. At NHS Tayside, within every patient record there is now the ability to request an MDT for that patient with tailored questions and information that is relevant. Request lists can be managed in real time with important information such as who is present at the meeting, the details of the discussion and then with actions and outcomes recorded in simple, intuitive fields with PDF reports recorded in the patient record as standard. The system replaces paper, physical sheets or emailed Word document that would previously need collating for meeting with notes typed and sent by email.
Why every hospital department should use EKORA®
What is evident from the experience at NHS Tayside is that their transition from paper records to EKORA® for Electronic Patient Records (EPR), Operation Notes, and Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT) collaborations, coupled with seamless integrations with e-observations and other systems, has significantly enhanced the efficiency of patient management. NHS Tayside has now implemented a comprehensive system that allows multiple individuals to simultaneously access and update patient information—a feat impossible with traditional paper-based records. This integrated approach ensures that all aspects of patient care are consolidated within a single system, with the added benefit of being able to upload previous notes and documents into EKORA®, creating a unified and comprehensive patient record.
For more information on how EKORA can help your Hospital or Department, get in touch.