Exploring by Topic: eLab

At HealthLink’s recent eLab roadshow, Erik Jacobsen (CEO of Danish Medical Data Distribution or DMDD) shared the numerous benefits Denmark has enjoyed since scrapping its paper-based system in favour of electronic pathology ordering eight years ago.

DMDD’s WebReq service enables fast and accurate capture of information directly from a GP’s practice management system/EMR into a laboratory information system (LIS).  Denmark is the world’s most advanced ePathology environment, with 80 labs using 13 different LIS systems and all GPs embracing WebReq.  HealthLink has worked with DMDD to make WebReq available in New Zealand under the eLab brand and it has launched successfully at Aotea Pathology in Wellington.  eLab will be available in Australia in the near future.

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This is a quick and somewhat belated sign off for the end of 2011.  We will close our office tomorrow afternoon (Friday 23rd December) but we will be open on every working day throughout the holiday period, providing support for 9000 plus medical centres across Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands.  So while you are holidaying relax, because we are on the job.

While it has been a very hard working year, we have also enjoyed considerable success and it is very gratifying to look at what has been achieved. Some highlights on the New Zealand front are…

• eLab: The Aotea Pathology eLab system is now used by more than 400 referring doctors in the Wellington region and nearly 20,000 electronic pathology requests have been sent.  The rollout continues apace and should be completed in early 2012.
• CareInsight: The Care Insight system has received very good feedback from the Hawkes Bay DHB’s clinical council and we anticipate getting sign off for it early in the New Year.  Care Insight is also live in Nelson.
• eReferral: We now have eight DHB regions using the HealthLink eReferral system.  The latest and most sophisticated installation the Auckland Regional DHB eReferrals system is now live on a number of practices, more than 300 referrals have been sent and rollout is commencing in early January.

In Australia, we have had a very busy and successful year too and we are involved in a major messaging project in readiness for the Personally Controlled electronic Health Record project which rolls out in July 2012.  In Vancouver, things are underway for a rollout early in 2012.

I would like to thank you for your continued support over 2011 and hope that you, your colleagues and family have a safe and enjoyable Christmas Break.  Happy Christmas!

Many procedures in medicine rely on an agreed “standard” approach to problems. These “standards” must evolve over time as the practice of medicine evolves. Health information systems are no different and they need to embrace appropriate standards to remove the need to reinvent IT systems again and again with consequent wastage of scarce resources.

At the recent HINZ 2011 conference, my colleague Colin Simmons and I presented a poster paper on a standards-based approach used to develop an electronic pathology ordering system known as eLab.

eLab enables medical practitioners to electronically order pathology tests and have them delivered to the appropriate laboratory.  With eLab, we utilised standards to provide a consistent user interface experience, regardless of which Electronic Medical Record system users order from. Standards also provided an accurate and consistent way to identify the patient, healthcare providers and the tests being ordered, resulting in a highly efficient and useful new tool for the sector.  The use of standards in eLab helped us to achieve a faster implementation by allowing us to leverage off work done elsewhere and focus our development efforts on a high-value, low-risk solution.

To learn more, download and read our short paper on health information standards in action.

eLab has been launched at Aotea Pathology in Wellington and is now being rolled out to the greater Wellington region.

Learn more about HealthLink’s use of standards to deliver eHealth solutions.

In 2009, HealthLink began a journey that culminated two weeks ago with the launch of the HealthLink eLab service at Aotea Pathology in Wellington.  That journey began in Vejle, a Danish City, where I met with Erik Jacobsen, Managing Director of DMDD, a Danish firm that specialises in the development of pathology ordering software.  I invited DMDD to work together to build an electronic pathology ordering system for use in the New Zealand, Australian and Canadian markets.

Knowing that Aotea Pathology was keen to innovate in this area, I met with them on my return to New Zealand and invited them to join the team. Aotea Pathology responded with enthusiasm and joined in the weekly phone conferences between Vejle and Auckland.  After many months of hard work, the new system was trialled in three Wellington practices and the pilot project was underway.

In the video below Dr Karen Wood, CEO of Aotea Pathology, and Keiry Belton, GM, describe the eLab project and explain what it means from Aotea Pathology’s perspective.  They discuss the key benefits of the eLab online test ordering system for GPs and patients as well as their plans for rolling out eLab to the greater Wellington region.

Last Thursday we had the pleasure of celebrating the launch of our new service eLab with our friends at Aotea Pathology in Wellington as well as with guest speaker the Hon Tony Ryall.  After more than two years of development, it was wonderful for us all to reflect on this significant achievement and improvement in service for the people of Wellington and the Hutt Valley.

eLab is a new online lab test ordering system that enables fast and accurate capture of information directly from a GP’s practice management system/EMR into a laboratory information system.  The benefits to the GP and patient are accurate information capture and improved clinical guidance at the time of requesting the pathology test.  Benefits to the lab include an improvement in the quality of information received and an opportunity to provide better information back to the clinician.

After two years of hard work to put this service together it is befitting to acknowledge the hard work by a number of people from across the sector:

• Aotea Pathology for having the foresight to implement world leading laboratory management practices.
• Karen Wood, the CEO of Aotea Pathology, for her leadership and positive drive.
• Keiry Belton, GM of Aotea Pathology, for ensuring the project stayed on track.
• The Project team at Aotea Pathology who worked diligently to implement a number of significant changes to their laboratory information system.
• The HealthLink project team who worked very hard to produce a system that would work well in the New Zealand healthcare environment and integrates seamlessly with the GP electronic medical records (EMR) systems.
• Danish Medical Data Distribution (DMDD) which developed the original version of eLab.  (In Denmark this system is used by every GP and almost all hospital laboratories).
• The Wellington general practices that piloted the system and provided constructive feedback.

View the video of the launch of eLab by Karen Wood, CEO of Aotea Pathology, and find out why eLab will appeal to patients like Hon Tony Ryall!

For further information on the launch of eLab at Aotea Pathology, please visit Aotea Pathology’s press release.