Altru Health System and six other area hospitals and long-term care facilities will be storing patient's medical information electronically by next fall, part of an effort to reduce medical errors and duplications and to become more efficient.
The project is being funded with a $1.6 million federal grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration. UND's Center for Rural Health is managing the grant.
Medical records from the six other facilities will be available to doctors at Altru, where patients most likely are to be transferred for more extensive care.
"When a Northwood (N.D.) patient goes to Altru by ambulance, they'll have that information and be ready to give them care the moment they come through the door," said Marlene Miller, one of two Center for Rural Health program directors.
Medical records reduce errors by giving doctors and nurses quick access to patient information, making the same information available to everyone who sees that patient and reducing possible confusion about doctors' handwriting, officials said at a news conference Tuesday announcing the grant.
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The software that hospitals and other facilities use to record medical information also often includes other features such as checklists for patients with certain symptoms that may make medical care more standardized and efficient, said Lynette Dickson, the center's other director.
Elizabeth Duke, Health Resources and Services Administration director, was on hand Tuesday to announce the grant. Doctors and officials have spoken for years of the value of electronic medical records, she said, but their value was underscored after 2005's Hurricane Katrina, when many patients' paper medical records were destroyed. The federal government hopes to have most medical records online by 2014.
With Altru Health System, the six area facilities included in the grant are:
-- Pembina County Memorial Hospital, Cavalier, N.D.
-- Wedgewood Manor, Cavalier.
-- Northwood Deaconess Health Center, Northwood.
-- Valley Community Health Center, Northwood.
-- First Care Health Center's Hospital and Clinic, Park River, N.D.
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Marks reports on higher education. Reach him at (701) 780-1105; (800) 477-6572, ext. 105, or jmarks@gfherald.com .
