We worked with Joint Base San Antonio and Brooke Army Medical Center to build a Virtual Health Management (VHM) System designed to address a substantial gap in the Military Health System, the Provider referral coordination process, communication effort, and subsequent patient communications. In addition, while tracking these steps along the way and documenting each task, the system is also updating all personnel involved (Providers, Staff, Patient).
Joint Base San Antonio & BAMC
Case Study
Virtual Health Coordination System
Hover (or tap) the hot-spots below to learn more about the highlighted features.
1
Did It / Missed It
Confirmation on whether a medical event as been done or missed.
2
Calendar
A full calendar to organize all past and upcoming events.
3
Groups
P2P & P2C Messaging and documentation organized by groups.
4
Messages
HIPAA Compliant messaging with text, photos, video and gifts.
Provider to Provider (P2P)
- Primary Care Provider (PCP) <—> Additional Provider / Specialist
- P2P Referral Coordination System
- P2P Communication / Messaging
- Provider On-Call Administration (POCC)
- Referral Documentation & Tracking
The systems in use today are not interoperable, which further exacerbates the problem. Additionally, they do not allow tracking and confirmation of the steps taken to ensure a referral has been accepted and completed. From the provider / referral standpoint – Genesis and AMION Scheduling systems are standalone point solutions that do not support tracking what steps are completed or communicating updates.
Provider to Patient (P2C)
- Provider <—> Patient
- P2P Referral Coordination System
- P2P Communication / Messaging
- Referral Documentation & Tracking
Additionally, none of the systems in use today offer Mobile Phone Applications. All coordination is currently managed via Desktop Computers and Pagers for notifications.
Provider to Patient (P2C)
- Provider <—> Patient
- P2P Referral Coordination System
- P2P Communication / Messaging
- Referral Documentation & Tracking
Additionally, none of the systems in use today offer Mobile Phone Applications. All coordination is currently managed via Desktop Computers and Pagers for notifications.
Managing the Gaps
To manage these gaps, the Outpatient App VHM will enable and automate referral coordination, messaging, referral confirmation, and provider on-call administration. One of the biggest benefits of this new system will be confirming and documenting these steps were taken back through the continuum of personnel involved. The Outpatient mobile and desktop notification system can include text and images, to support immediate knowledge sharing.
The VHM system will save hundreds of hours of redundancy for the medical teams, while also improving the speed of care for the service members needing attention. Further, VHM has several other practical benefits that are mission critical to Service Member health and performance.
Medical Readiness for Deployment
- If Disqualified for a health condition during medical clearance, the service member needs to be examined, treated if necessary, and confirmed resolved when appropriate.
- Even though the Provider Referral process is considered “Patient Care” and not “Combat Support”, issues with confirmation and communication of a resolved Provider Referral back through to the Medical Readiness team is a significant cause for delays in Readiness (IMR).
Prompt and Effective Service Member Patient Care
- The gaps in communication and confirmation of referrals often cause delays in addressing health issues of Service Members.
- These same gaps also enable incorrect diagnosis of health issues. A referring Provider may not fully understand a diagnosis that another Provider or Specialist can quickly correct. The delays can worsen the problem or cause unnecessary medical treatment inefficiencies.
Human Decision Time and Administrative Efficiency
- Free-Form Text Fields currently in use today allow for mistakes or lack of proper documentation to accompany referral requests.
- Outpatient App can leverage text and image machine learning to transform notes into structured data along with the referral.
- Optimizing on-call provider schedules with automated referral workflows also drastically reduces immense workload on administrative schedulers (referral management center).
