Summa Health, an Ohio Hospital system, recently changed ED contracts from their 40 year group to a new one. On FOUR DAYS NOTICE! Four days, over the Christmas/New Years Holiday. That sounds distinctly unsafe, beyond the gross lack of sense, or commitment to a 40 year partner.
In case you think this is going smoothly, heres a post to the ACEP ED Informatics Section from one of their former doctors (reproduced here with permission in its entirety):
I wanted to inform you, my colleagues, about what is going on at my home institution. You all know me as a colleague and a fierce advocate of patient safety in EHRs. I have published on EHR patient safety for ACEP task forces and I am heading up a new ACEP task force on EHR patient safety issue reporting. It is with sadness that I have to tell you what is going in right now at my home institution.
Summa has gone to paper.
About 36 hours ago, our contract was taken over by US Acute Care Solutions (USACS) formerly EMP, through a scandalous process, but they literally created no plan for EHR transition. I was the director of informatics and I, along with the rest of the physicians, was notified 4 days before New Years Eve that we were out. We were told that when the ball dropped, our contract was over. The physicians coming in to take over were to arrive at the facility for the first time 1 hr before their shifts and we were to sign out to doctors that had no EHR access. No access to old records, CPOE, PACS, etc. They went the first 30 hours without access. Nurses were asked to do triage protocols and put the orders in under the new medical director, the only one with an account. This morning at 30 hrs into the process some were to start training. Now, the only information I get now is hearsay. We strongly believe the EMP/USACS has no chance of safely staffing our 5 EDs with a total of 175k volume using part-time docs who have other full time jobs. Our 55 docs and 20 PAs are sitting at home right now, scared for the patients that show up at the hospitals where their group spent the last 4 decades saving lives. As a board certified clinical informaticist, I offered my services up until midnight when our contract ended but they elected to move another direction. To the patients of Summa, Im sorry.
- See more at:
http://gruntdoc.com/#sthash.vxpvjr8d.M8Xp80IN.dpuf