We understand that change, whether in business, life or any other endeavour can be a daunting experience, especially if mismanaged. That said, change is inevitable and is sometimes described as life’s only constant, so it’s important to understand how to use it to your advantage. When it comes to operating an Aged Care Facility, one of the most productive changes that can be made is regarding your clinical system; the computer system that you use to manage and record:
- patient data
- clinical notes
- medication history
- laboratory reports
- and so much more.
So, let’s take a look at what a change to your aged care facility’s clinical system can provide and the steps required to make the transition as seamless as possible for your staff, your patients and your business. As all aged care providers know, effective reporting of serious incidents such as physical or sexual assault is necessary to preserve the health and safety of residents.
The potential benefits of changing your clinical system
If managed correctly, changing your aged care facility’s clinical software system to an upgraded and more suitable software alternative can be highly beneficial for factors such as improved safety, stability, accuracy and compliance around resident care. As a central database for all of the management requirements of your aged care facility, you can typically expect the change to lead to:
1. Happier staff: An upgrade to a more comprehensive CIS will streamline processes such as lodging clinical notes and patient data, minimising administrative burdens so that your staff can focus on providing top-quality care to patients.
2. Lower costs: Having a comprehensive CIS keeps all of the facility’s data and information in one, easily accessible place. This minimises the need for multiple clinical software platforms and associated costs as well as reduces the time and resources that were previously spent on software mishaps, inconsistencies and inefficiencies.
3. Smooth adoption of legislative changes: A high-quality clinical system is not a static system. Much like the legislation surrounding aged care, it is malleable and adaptable. This means that your aged care facility can remain up-to-date on all legislative changes and that these changes will also be accounted for in regular system updates so as to minimise the need for another CIS change in the future.
With so much to gain from changing your aged care facility’s clinical system, let’s take a look at the steps you can take to make this transition as seamless as possible.
The person-orientated steps necessary to change your clinical platform
Surprisingly, clinical software transition is often a very human-focused process requiring some important considerations. If you have chosen to begin a smooth CIS transition, we recommend that you act on the following steps for maximum satisfaction amongst staff and patients.
1. Identify all persons on the current system: This will give you a solid overview of your staff and allow you to ensure that it is up to date so no employee is left out from the new clinical software or that past employees are not unnecessarily included.
2. Identify the impact of each person’s behaviour: Here, it is important to get a snapshot of the value and output of each of the aged care employees of the facility and ensure that this is appropriately accounted for in the new system.
3. Train staff and create a training matrix to track their competency: As with any change, adopting a new CIS will require new skills and an understanding of how to use the system. It is important not only to train staff in the first instance but also to use the quality system to track this training and their competency.\
4. Conduct a clinical system health check before going live: All new systems are prone to bugs and teething problems. With that in mind, it’s important to do a quick check-up of the health and functionality of the new clinical system before taking it live and adopting it completely.
The system-orientated steps necessary to change your clinical system
1. Configure the new CIS to minimise impacts on each person: Naturally, any new system will require some moulding to meet the unique and diverse needs of the staff at your aged care facility. It is important to configure a new CIS system to minimise the impact it may have on each individual.
2. Import resident details into new system: While this transfer stage may be tedious, it is a necessary step in the short term to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the CIS in the long term. The recommended way is to have a dedicated team of ‘data transfer’ individuals who are available for the migration period be it for one home or a group of homes, ideally two persons per home to progress through the migration efficiently and accurately. Develop an assessment mapping document to track progress (one per resident), As part of the data transfer team, a Registered Nurse to check the resultant care plan under the CIS comparing it to the older CIS care plan; this is a quick check as the team progresses through the migration and ensuring the integrity of data.
3. Re-assessing each resident in the new system based on existing assessments: The change from one system to a new or upgraded alternative is the perfect time to re-assess each of your aged care residents, as well as their needs and concerns to ensure all of your information is as up to date and useful as possible moving forward.
4. Update policies and procedures to reflect changes from the new clinical system: This step is perhaps one of the most vital in a smooth CIS transition as it ensures seamless and consistent operation moving forward and that all policies are visible and actionable in the new system.
Consider Acredia Care for a smooth transition to a new clinical system
By seamlessly transitioning to the Acredia clinical care platform, you can:
- Save costs
- Reduce tedious hours of work
- Accurately record data
- Easily adopt legislative changes
Acredia is constantly updating the clinical software platform to ensure it and your aged care facility are kept up-to-date and functional today and long into the future.
