Medway goes live with electronic prescribing and patient record systems

Medway NHS Foundation Trust has successfully gone live with an electronic prescribing and medications management (ePMA) system and deployed an electronic patient record (EPR) within its emergency department.

Medway first implemented Altera Digital Health’s Sunrise EPR across the trust’s 24 adult inpatient wards at the end of 2021. To join up the patient experience, the trust has now deployed the solution across its emergency department (ED) too.

The move will help drive improved patient care through better patient flow through the hospital, faster admission to inpatient wards, more efficient discharges and greater oversight of patient data.

This latest phase of the trust’s wider EPR strategy has also seen Medway go live with its ePMA, just four days after the EPR was extended.

The deployment of the ePMA at Medway will help to improve patient safety, deliver major financial benefits and ensure compliance with the Professional Records Standards Body (PRSB).

Suzanne O’Neil, EPR director, Medway, said: “There was a real desire to be able to use Sunrise in ED.

“Doctors and nurses didn’t want to start a patient’s notes on paper and then move to digital; it is much more beneficial to have the whole patient pathway documented digitally. This really helped to accelerate the implementation of Sunrise within ED as the staff buy-in was there from the start.”

As with the earlier deployment, Medway prioritised the formation of a multidisciplinary team, with clinical, operational, pharmaceutical and IT leads collaborating on the project. It also worked with neighbouring trusts, including Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust, to ensure a smooth go-live for both the extension of the EPR and the ePMA.

Michael Beckett, director of IT at Medway NHS FT said: ” Having a dedicated pharmacist on this project has been critical in terms of the development of the medication catalogue and order sets. This will ensure that our EPR provides improved patient safety, better auditing, and financial benefits in terms of stock control or prescribing management.”

The two systems were rolled out within just four days of each other. Paula Ridd, general manager UK & Ireland at Altera Digital Health, added: “Once again, Medway has demonstrated remarkable levels of planning and determination to achieve two significant go-lives within days of each other, proving that digital transformation can be achieved in a matter of months, not years.