Get creative: Using the engine to compensate for unsynchronized EHRs

Perhaps the greatest additional advantage of having an integration platform in the middle of your health IT environment is the creativity it offers above and beyond HL7 v2 interfaces. While approximately 90% of healthcare provider interfaces are comprised of v2 interfaces, many Corepoint customers are improving patient and provider workflows with a creative approach.

In this example, I’ll briefly describe how the engine can help the hospital compensate when the EHR is not synchronized with the Lab system. For example, when a patient is instructed by their doctor to walk down the hall to the Lab for blood work. The patient and the patient’s ORM message often arrive at the Lab for their exam before their doctor’s office EHR transmits their demographic info.

Believe it or not, this is a fairly common problem in hospitals. If the Lab system receives the order before it receives the patient’s demographics, it’s typically going to fail.

Here’s a workaround many Corepoint Integration Engine users have implemented:

• When the doctor’s EHR sends an order, the engine can quickly check in the LIS to see if they have the ADT info on the patient.
• If no information exists, the engine can hold the order until the ADT is received, which usually takes just a few minutes. The order is placed in a bin and a timer can be set in the engine – a minute, 5 minutes, an hour, etc. – to check with the LIS again for the patient’s ADT info.
• When the ADT is available in the LIS, it is paired with the order and any other order for that patient that has been submitted, and then released into the LIS.

This is just one of many creative ways Corepoint customers are using the engine to connect data to care. It improves patient satisfaction and satisfaction of the users of the EHR and the LIS.