Australia’s largest local health district, Hunter New England Health (LHD), will use Patientrack’s e-observation platform for hospitals to analyze patients’ vital signs data in order to alert as soon as possible clinicians when intervention is needed.
Hunter New England Health, which provides a range of public health services in New South Wales to the Hunter, New England and Lower Mid North Coast regions, will implement the device in over 43 sites in the district.
Tracking vital signs for early clinical interventions
Based in England and Australia, Patientrack provides hospitals with an electronic observation technology that allows clinicians to record vital signs on mobile devices rather than onto paper documents.
The software automatically and accurately calculates early warning scores for each patient based on their health data and alerts relevant clinicians if there is reason to be concerned so they can intervene before a critical situation.
Progressive deployment in Australia and New Zealand
The device has already been implemented in a number of UK health centers, including St Helens and Knowsley Hospitals, Western Sussex Hospitals and NHS Fife centers.
Patientrack is marketed and delivered in Australia and New Zealand through sole distributor MKM Health and should be launched at Maitland Hospital (New South Wales) in the near future ; it will be deployed gradually across the rest of the region.
A MKM Health spokesman said the new deal builds on previous success for Patientrack in the Australasia region, where in New Zealand this past May, Counties Manukau District Health Board became the fourth organization to choose Patientrack technology in just over 12 months.
The data collected will be used for other digital health devices
Kate Quirke, CEO of MKM Health, said the company will ensure that the information collected via Patientrack is available to other systems, so that data can be used with the NSW Health shared electronic health record (source: Digitalhealth.net).
Improving electronic health records systems
« We will work with Hunter New England Health to deliver electronic medical record functionality and to demonstrate the broader benefits of enhanced clinical documentation at the bedside and improved communication across clinical teams, » she added.