Specialist Referrals. Statistical Update September Hospitals/Clinical Centres: 84

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1 Volume 2, Issue IV September 2016 Statistical Update September 2016 Hospitals/Clinical Centres: 84 GPs using HealthlinkOnline: 3955 Practices: 1499 Inside this Issue Specialist Referrals New Services & Project Updates Messages by Hospital Referral Stats Healthlink Move If you would like to join the Healthlink newsletter mailing list, please your details to Welcome to the Q Healthlink newsletter. I am happy to take this opportunity to update you on developments in the project, newly launched services and plans for the coming year. I hope it will be a useful source of information and I am keen to hear your thoughts and feedback. Gemma Garvan, Healthlink Project Manager Specialist Referrals The specialist Ophthalmology referral form is now in use in Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital. The pilot began ahead of schedule on 22nd August and is available for all GPs to use via their practice software or HealthlinkOnline. When the pilot phase is complete, the service will be made available to all Ophthalmology departments in hospitals nationwide. The form is based on the national OPD General Referral form with the addition of specific questions related to Ophthalmology, in particular visual acuity. The form was agreed with the clinical lead for Ophthalmology at Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital ( RVEEH ) and with the Quality in Practice Committee of the ICGP. When the referrals are received at the hospital they are automatically integrated with the hospital s EPR system. This means they will not have to be printed upon receipt at the hospital but can be reviewed and triaged from any PC on the network. From the GP s perspective, acknowledgements are available instantly once the referral has been sent and triage information will be returned from the hospital within an agreed timeframe. Patient care is improved as GPs can offer reassurance that the referral is being actioned in the hospital. Patients also benefit from a more efficient referral which is faster, safer and contains all the specific clinical information necessary for the Consultant team. Healthlink have also developed a specialist Endoscopy referral form which is currently being tested. St. Vincent s University Hospital along with St. Columcille s and St. Michael s Hospital, Dun Laoghaire are the pilot sites for this referral. The Endoscopy form will comprise of the existing general referral form with an additional page of detail to facilitate triaging of referrals for Upper and Lower GI procedures. Similarly to Ophthalmology, once the pilot has been successfully completed it will be rolled out to GPs nationally. Other specialist referral forms in development are Colposcopy and Home Based Treatment Team referral for Mental Health.

2 New Services & Project Updates Radiology Ordering Radiology ordering will allow GPs to generate electronic orders via Healthlink, which will then be made available to the appropriate Radiology Information System ( RIS) e.g. NIMIS, AGFA, Affidea. The message standard and version is the same as is used in GP messaging nationally, Health Level Seven version 2.4 with XML encoding. The initial scope of this project will focus on the implementation of orders for xray and ultrasound. The processing of order response messages will provide GPs with sufficient details to enable the matching of orders with their corresponding results. Discharge Summaries When a patient is discharged from hospital it is important that a complete and correct record of the stay is communicated back to their General Practitioner in a timely manner. Healthlink has been sending electronic Discharge Summaries from a number of hospitals over recent years, allowing the primary care professionals to continue a high level of patient care after discharge. Discharge messages can be generated from inpatient admissions or from Emergency Departments. Mandatory information in each summary includes date of discharge and discharge disposition ( eg. home/respite care ). From a clinical perspective the message contains all the relevant information a GP needs in terms of diagnoses, operations or investigations performed and a description of the course of the patient s illness during the hospital stay. Medication details are also sent in a Discharge Summary. Finally, the discharge message may include information regarding the future management of the patient, with actions for both the Hospital and GP/Social Care ( where applicable ). Healthlink have recently implemented a more structured discharge message based on HIQA s National Standard for Patient Discharge Summary Information. The new Standard defines the information required in a generic clinical discharge summary without being so detailed as to delay the sending of the summary on the day of discharge. Individual Health Identifier ( IHI ) The technology infrastructure to support the individual health identifier is in place. The HSE is ready to place the individual health identifier on all electronic referrals as soon as the Department of Health has cleared the IHI legislation. A number of other systems eg. NIMIS will also be connected to the IHI solution shortly and the number will become the single identifier for patients in the Irish health system. Other Messaging Updates We are at network testing stage with the Out of Hours Service MIDOC in Longford and Westmeath on enabling electronic reports for GPs. We hope to have this service in pilot by the end of the year. We are working with Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital on expanding the range of messages they can send to General Practitioners. Currently we are testing A&E Notifications and Inpatient Admissions. Hospital to hospital referrals are on Healthlink s work plan for Q We have had several requests for this service across a range of specialties to include spinal, baby hips and neurosurgery.

3 Services at a glance - Outbound messages per hospital Hospital/Clinical Centre Page 3 Lab Radiology Discharge Summary Discharge A&E A&E Letter Death OPD Waiting List Inpatient Admission Cardiology Report Outpatient Clinic Letter Alliance Strencom AMNCH ж Bantry General Beacon Beaumont Cappagh CareDoc Cavan General Connolly CUH Coombe Crumlin Ennis General Affidea Kerry General KDoc Letterkenny ж Limerick Louth County Mater Mater Private Mayo General MedLab Merlin Park MIDOC Mullingar General Naas General NVRL Nenagh NEDoc Our Lady s, Drogheda Our Lady s, Navan Portiuncula Portlaoise Roscommon County Rotunda RVEEH ж ж ShannonDoc Sligo General South Infirmary Victoria South Tipperary SouthDoc St. Columcille's St. James's St. John of God s St. John s, Limerick St. Luke s, Kilkenny St. Mary s, Phoenix Park St. Michael's St. Vincent s St. Vincent s Private Temple St. Tullamore UCHG Waterford WestDoc Wexford Live ж = Planned Volume 2, Issue IV Co-op Report ж

4 Referrals by hospital Number of messages received by date Live ж = Planned Breast Prostate Lung Pigmented Lesion Neurology General AMNCH Bantry General Hospital Beacon Hospital Beaumont Hospital Cappagh National Orthopaedic Hospital Cavan Monaghan Hospital Connolly Hospital Coombe Women & Infants University Hospital Cork University Hospital Kerry General Hospital Letterkenny University Hospital Louth County Hospital Mallow General Hospital Mater Private Hospital Mater Public Hospital Mayo University Hospital Mercy University Hospital Midland Regional Hospital Mullingar Midland Regional Hospital Portlaoise Midland Regional Hospital Tullamore Naas General Hospital National Maternity Hospital Holles Street Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital Our Lady's Hospital Navan Portiuncula University Hospital Roscommon University Hospital Rotunda Hospital Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital Sligo University Hospital South Infirmary Victoria Hospital South Tipperary General Hospital St. Columcille's Hospital St. James's Hospital St. Luke's Hospital, Kilkenny St. Michael's Hospital St. Vincent's University Hospital Temple Street Children s University Hospital UL Hospitals Group University Hospital Galway University Hospital Limerick University Hospital Waterford Wexford General Hospital Breast Prostate Lung Pigmented Lesion Neurology General Total /01/ /03/ /04/ /06/ /07/ /09/ Volume 2, Issue IV Page 4

5 Healthlink Transfers to HSE In July this year the Healthlink service and team transferred to the HSE to become the first operating group of ehealth Ireland. As part of that move we have a new office location, details are as follows: 3rd Floor, Kings Inns House, 200 Parnell St, Dublin 1 Phone: Shortlisted for GPBuddy Award The ereferrals project was recently shortlisted for a GPBuddy award. The GPBuddy awards recognise the achievements of healthcare providers who work in collaboration to deliver an innovative primary care solution in healthcare in Ireland today. The National ereferral Rollout Project is a joint collaboration between Healthlink, Office of the Chief Information Officer, Hospitals and Primary Care working closely with OSPIP. The number of referrals made electronically continue to grow and in August there were 10,733 general ereferrals. 1,081 GPs that have sent at least one general ereferral during that month. About Healthlink The National Healthlink Project provides a web-based messaging service which allows the secure transmission of clinical patient information between Hospitals, Health Care Agencies and General Practitioners. In the past 20 years Healthlink has expanded from a single hospital proof-of-concept to a national broker for country-wide messaging with over 10 million exchanges of information annually. Healthlink messaging is at the core of the National Electronic General Referral Project, the National Cancer Control Programme referral initiatives and GP communication from the National Screening Service. Alongside national projects, Healthlink transfers a range of messages in real time including laboratory and radiology reports, discharge information and waiting list updates. Message files are specified in HL7, an internationally recognised standard for healthcare information exchange and formatted in XML. The system interfaces with hospitals, clinical centres, healthcare agencies and GP practice management systems and transfers data via a secure network to its messaging servers. The HealthlinkOnline portal is secured with SSL and Client Certificates. Web Services are also made available as an alternative access to our system and for best interoperability. Healthlink was the first operating group to join ehealth Ireland in National Healthlink Project Kings Inns House, 200 Parnell St, Dublin 1 Phone: info@healthlink.ie