A man has been in a motorcycle accident. He’s in your healthcare system now, somewhere between the ED for evaluation and the discharge desk en route home. How’d you do at coordinating his care across all the steps in between?
A contributing writer for the American Medical Association’s Hospitals & Health Networks takes up the hypothetical in a June 16 online article.
In the second of several multispecialty “handoffs,” the writer, vendor CEO Brad Brooks of TigerText, pictures a radiologist ordering x-rays of Smith’s leg after receiving a text message from the ED physician.
“Meanwhile, the ED physician locates the on-call orthopedic surgeon on his mobile device, and the surgeon is then added to the group,” Brooks writes. “The orthopedic surgeon and other members of the care team can ask questions in real time through group text. … Based on the combined data from the group communication, Smith is scheduled for emergency surgery through the mobile, integrated clinical communication platform.”
While Brooks is hardly an impartial observer of texting-based coordinated care, his fictional scenario is concise and worth considering. Read the whole thing:
Dave P. has worked in journalism, marketing and public relations for more than 30 years, frequently concentrating on hospitals, healthcare technology and Catholic communications. He has also specialized in fundraising communications, ghostwriting for CEOs of local, national and global charities, nonprofits and foundations.