Docman Driving innovation to support GPs with patient access

CASTLEFORD, U.K. - April 4, 2013 - PRLog -- The Government has set the challenge for GPs to make patient’s medical information available by 2015. PCTI has been in consultation with the medical community to understand the issues. Following in-depth research, PCTI is looking for further engagement to explore an approach to enabling GPs to deliver meaningful clinical information to patients through the familiar Docman interface.

PCTI showcased their demonstrator solution for supporting Patient Access at the recent Healthcare Innovation Expo 2013 and was part of the NHS Commissioning Board’s sponsored innovation App Zone.

Ian Moody, Director of Product Strategy, PCTI “From research we found that GPs are concerned about the information that a patient views and the implications for information governance and practice workloads. It is apparent careful consideration is required in delivering what information should be made available to the patient.”

“PCTI has developed an innovative solution to support GPs in making clinical information available electronically and we are actively speaking with GPs and clinicians to help inform us on the next stage of product development. The solution will improve patient engagement and their understanding during the care process. The application is an extension of the existing familiar electronic document workflow and provides the GP with the ability to make a letter available to a patient with one mouse click. The patient’s documents are then made available through another parties’ patient portal or mobile app.”

“The solution enables a GP to provide clinical narrative and supplementary information like patient leaflets that can be selected from within Docman BackOffice. This will ensure that the patient has all the relevant information to allow them to be actively involved in important decisions about their care.”

“A practice will benefit from delivering meaningful access of patient information by incorporating functionality into existing GP workflow processes. This will provide a full audit trail to the practice and enable a GP to provide meaningful information to a patient. The solution will ensure patients have improved knowledge by going beyond patient access to develop engagement.”

Mike Walton, GP IT Lead at Harvey Group Practice, St Albans, member of EMIS NUG Committee “GPs surgeries are fully aware of the current drivers towards enabling patient’s to view their own records. This is posing administrative, medical, legal and ethical challenges to practices. Processes which help to overcome these barriers are welcome. The concept of PCTI working together with existing system suppliers in order to advance the agenda would be very welcome in order to offer real benefits and GP surgeries.”

The application provides a platform for future developments to support patient to practice messaging to enhance the care process and support targeted electronic distribution of information to patients e.g. condition specific information leaflets or public health notices.

Docman is used by 6,000 GP practices as a complete electronic document management, collaboration and workflow solution for all clinical and non-clinical information.

PCTI is looking to engage with healthcare professionals to explore the concept and innovation. If you are interested in exploring opportunities, please contact Ian Moody, Director of Product Strategy, by email to docman@pcti.co.uk (mailto:ianmoody@pcti.co.uk)