Major health system adopts electronic medical record technology for clinical oncology

An electronic medical record and practice management system has been adopted by the clinical oncology departments at Continuum Health Partners, a network of five hospitals in the New York area that includes Beth Israel Medical Center.

The IntelliDose (IntrinsiQ) system will support the expanded cancer care services within the network, which also includes St. Luke’s and Roosevelt hospitals.

Ronald H. Blum, MD, director of Cancer Centers and Programs at Beth Israel Cancer Center, told HemOnc Today that use of the technology will help to standardize regimens across the health system.

“The unit not only standardizes chemotherapy regimens, but it also provides information on ancillary and palliative drugs, in addition to nursing procedures,” Blum said. “This reduces medical error.”

The regimens recommended within the Continuum system had been reviewed and were reconciled with national guidelines, according to Blum, who added that the current system is an established program that has been used with efficacy in multiple settings. “We are not starting from ground zero,” he said.

The technology is designed in such a way that a physician, a pharmacist and a nurse will have to sign off on every treatment and dose, which would all but eliminate any potential technological errors which may occur, Blum said.

“Moreover, the interface is developed with parameters in place for each drug,” he said. “For example, if you are off by a zero when you input the treatment regimen, the system will reject the prescription.”

Blum said the regimens pre-loaded into the system were based on predictable clinical scenarios, but there is room to make modifications.

“The goal is to use standardized regimens,” he said. “However, if the clinician makes a decision in the moment, documentation of how and why the change was made will be required. There is a track record for clinical decisions that forces physicians to think through dose modification. There are several layers of approval involved.”

Follow HemOncToday.com on Twitter.