Kanta-Häme Hospital District: Hämeenlinna knows its patients

Learning the new system

Lifecare was deployed in the Kanta-Häme Hospital District in March 2019. Assistant Head Nurse Marjaana Tegelberg and Medical Specialist (geriatrics, pulmonology) Kristiina Vuorinen of Kanta-Häme Central Hospital, Hämeenlinna share their experiences of using Lifecare.

Tegelberg works in the pulmonary and internal diseases inpatient ward as well as in an administrative role. When working in the inpatient ward, Tegelberg uses Lifecare daily. For her, learning how to enter data into the system required some effort. However, when necessary information is carefully logged into the system, patient data follow-up is easy.

”The personnel was onboarded when Lifecare was deployed. We quickly noticed that it’s not as tricky to use as we’d anticipated. The medications section, which changed the most, required the biggest learning efforts.”, Tegelberg says.

Vuorinen works in the surgery ward as a hospitalist i.e. she specializes in managing patients’ preceding illnesses if they are worsened by surgery or other factors.

”I’m following more or less all entries made of a patient. The Kanta-Häme Central Hospital and the health centers use the same system, which makes it a lot easier to track different medical records, laboratory tests and other examination results.”, Vuorinen says.

Care chain follow-up is easier than ever

Learning to use Lifecare has been easy for Tegelberg. These days, she is very familiar with the patient summary page and has learned to use it in a more versatile way.

”I like the visuals. Sometimes I’d like to have two screens because you can click open many different windows and datasets. It’s good that you can simultaneously read doctor’s notes and read and write the nursing care plan.“

For Tegelberg, the most important features of the system are the nursing care plan, observation chart and the medications section. Furthermore, her work benefits from the easy retrieval of different documents – the patient’s summary page shows, for example, pictures taken of a wound.

”Risk factors, such as allergies and DNRs (Do Not Resuscitate), are also shown and can be accessed immediately. As one can imagine, for example DNRs are very important in the internal diseases ward. All in all, the number of clicks has decreased from before.”, Tegelberg says.

The medications section has been developed, among other things, by harmonizing procedures. Medication lists and alterations to medications are now handled identically in every ward.

Because of Lifecare, primary and specialized healthcare now use the same system, making care chains significantly easier to follow.

”We can see – and easily search for – whether a patient has been to a health center for an ailment before. We can avoid doing overlapping examinations by reviewing the patient’s history. All in all, the more we know our patients, the better we can treat them.”, Vuorinen says.