Software eliminates work, improves service for dialysis patients

Software eliminates work, improves service for dialysis patients

BY JUANA GYEK, SUN STAFF WRITER
August 26, 2007 - 4:21PM

DaVita Yuma Dialysis is counting on recently upgraded software to improve care for kidney patients by reducing nurses' paperwork and giving doctors access to patient records at any time and place.

DaVita has completed the integration of its recently purchased 525 centers into the company's high-tech charting software, Snappy, said Anthony Gabriel, chief operating officer of the integration.

DaVita, one of the largest dialysis providers in the United States, provides services for people diagnosed with chronic kidney failure and renal disease.

Snappy eliminates much of the paper documentation for dialysis treatments because nurses are now able to enter all the information into computer terminals located beside each of the dialysis chairs, Gabriel explained.

"So as dialysis technicians and nurses are performing the treatment, they are entering data for that treatment right there," he said.

Also, dialysis machines are interfaced into the computer system so that data collected by the machine is recorded automatically into the patient's records.

Patient medications, lab results and doctor orders and instructions are also entered into the system to be accessed by nurses.

The software allows physicians to electronically sign off on instructions so that transcription and writing errors are eliminated, Gabriel said.

"We make sure that what the doctor sees and signs off on is exactly what the patient gets," he said.

The system is also able to produce reports indicating which patients at each clinic require additional attention, such as checking the patient's blood count or dialysis run-time.

With Snappy, doctors are able to obtain this information and patient records in a much more ordered fashion as well as being able to access it via the Internet.

"The doctors can look at it ... wherever they happen to be as long as they've got Internet access," Gabriel said.

The computer system does not change how or how frequently patients receive dialysis treatment, he said, but allows the medical staff to administer it more efficiently.

DaVita in Yuma was the last to be integrated as the company systematically upgraded the software in each of its centers, starting from Florida and moving to the West Coast.

The Yuma center started using Snappy Aug. 2 without any problems, and workers are adjusting to it "really well," said Nique Ashby, facility administrator at the clinic. The integration went "very smoothly without any issues."

With the new software, nurses will spend less time dealing with the computer and paperwork and will have more time for personal quality patient care, said Ashby, who considers this to be the "biggest" benefit of the change.

Snappy will also facilitate travel for patients since records can be e-mailed and accessed through the Internet at any other DaVita center in the country, she said.

Now, more than 1,300 DaVita centers across the United States, including Yuma's clinic, currently work with the software that records all patient information on the online computerized system, said Gabriel.

"The new systems bring aboard a lot of reporting capabilities that didn't exist previously ... I think that will translate into improved patient care.'

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Juana M. Gyek can be reached at jgyek@yumasun.com or 539-6872.

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