Most organizations are investigating ways to help their clinicians spend more time at the bedside yet still document and gather needed information. However, workstations are not always conveniently located, and some hospital floors need more space for patients in isolation. Finding dedicated, convenient workstation space for charting is tough – that’s why clinicians need effective mobile solutions.
On-the-go care with the Epic Rover app
The Epic Rover mobile app can help with charting and patient documentation on-the-go while maintaining patient safety. Once clinicians install the Epic Rover app on a smartphone or other iOS device and login, they have access to the integrated Epic Hyperspace environment and can take advantage of native mobile device features:
- Camera. Scan barcodes, take images and import them directly into Epic with the mobile device camera — all while keeping the information confidential.
- Touchscreen. Document vital signs, complete basic flowsheet documentation, and choose answers to multiple select questions using the convenience of their device touchscreen. They can access multiple Epic applications such as EpicCare Inpatient, Beaker, Radiant, Dorothy, Comfort, Wound Care, and Grand Central to name a few.
- Mobility. Allowing users to document on the go, Rover saves time and increases compliance for tasks. For example, EVS and transport users, don’t have to login to a workstation and then into Epic to see the work to be done. They don’t have to call into an external system to complete their work tasks.
The Rover app supports multiple workflows in Epic and can help with tasks like these:
- BCMA (bar-coded medication administration)
- VS and other simple flowsheet documentation
- Lab collection
- Transport notification
- EVS users can take action on assigned requests
- Work list tasks
- Notifications about new Orders
- Blood Administration
- Patient and clinical image capture including Wound documentation
- LDA (lines, drains, airways, wounds) documentation with an avatar
Walking in their shoes with Rover
Nursing is a group that can have much success with Rover. Mobile devices can help improve patient safety, because nurses can complete medication administration and administration warnings as they pop up. If they are completing wound care, the clinician can take a picture of the wound and embed it into the chart information. This would accompany the discrete documentation of the LDA wound with location and other details on a patient avatar available on the screen.
For facilities using Beaker, Rover can allow phlebotomists to perform draws as they move through the hospital, even when workstations are not available. With Rover, positive patient identification workflows can be a part of the workflow as well as on-the-go label printing and collection information. This can be used for nursing as well.
Rover also helps organizations using Dorothy (Home Health) and Comfort (Palliative care) applications to record visits, transit times, distance, and manage other pieces of documentation needed for visits.
After going live on Rover with our nursing teams at one particular hospital, the respiratory therapists contacted us about using Rover, too. We worked with them on ways Rover could help simplify workflows with nebulizers and other types of treatments, which helped make caring for patients easier for them.
All of these workflows can be completed while still providing the necessary safety precautions and notifications. If your hospital or organization isn’t using Epic Rover yet and would like to start, contact us and we can help your care teams navigate Epic mobility solutions.
Editor’s note: Epic products referenced in this blog are trademarked; refer to the Epic trademark list for a comprehensive list.
