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Ebola, electronic medical records, and Epic Systems
MichelleMalkin ^ | 10/7/14 | michellemalkin

Posted on 10/08/2014 7:48:54 AM PDT by DFG

A Dallas hospital’s bizarre bungle of the first U.S. case of Ebola leaves me wondering:

Is someone covering up for a crony billionaire Obama donor and her controversy-plagued, taxpayer-subsidized electronic medical records company?

Last week, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital revealed in a statement that a procedural flaw in its online health records system led to potentially deadly miscommunication between nurses and doctors. The facility sent Ebola victim Thomas Duncan home despite showing signs of the disease—only to admit him with worse symptoms three days later.

Hospital officials, who came forward “in the interest of transparency,” initially cited workflow and information-sharing problems for the botch. “Protocols were followed by both the physician and the nurses,” the statement noted. “However, we have identified a flaw in the way the physician and nursing portions of our electronic health records interacted in this specific case.”

(Excerpt) Read more at michellemalkin.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: ebola; emr; epic; faulkner; malkin; obamaebola

1 posted on 10/08/2014 7:48:54 AM PDT by DFG
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To: DFG; neverdem; ProtectOurFreedom; Mother Abigail; EBH; vetvetdoug; Smokin' Joe; Global2010; ...
Most. Transparent. Administration. Ever!

Bring Out Your Dead

Post to me or FReep mail to be on/off the Bring Out Your Dead ping list.

The purpose of the “Bring Out Your Dead” ping list (formerly the “Ebola” ping list) is very early warning of emerging pandemics, as such it has a high false positive rate.

So far the false positive rate is 100%.

At some point we may well have a high mortality pandemic, and likely as not the “Bring Out Your Dead” threads will miss the beginning entirely.

*sigh* Such is life, and death...

2 posted on 10/08/2014 7:51:34 AM PDT by null and void ("Agoraphobia": fear of the marketplace; "AlGoreaphobia": fear of the marketplace of ideas.)
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To: DFG
One of the reasons I really don't trust the MSM is because in my life I have had personal, direct knowledge of about 5 events that made national or international news, and what I witnessed, or otherwise had personal knowledge of, bore no resemblance to what was reported.

While I do not have direct knowledge of what happened at Texas Health Presbyterian, I do have direct knowledge of the Epic EMR software. I am not an Epic employee, but I do use Epic and configure it on a daily basis. It is my day job. I have it running right now on the same computer I'm writing this post on. My son (also not an Epic employee) has implemented their ASAP Emergency Department application in both adult and pediatric emergency departments in three hospitals. What I can say is this:

Epic is an extremely complicated, comprehensive, highly configurable, integrated system of computer applications. NO hospital installs Epic without doing massive configuration to customize it to run the way they want. Many of those customizations have to do with who sees what data entered by whom. It is far more likely that the problem at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital was due to training designed and conducted by the hospital, or to the way they configured the system, than to any inherent bug in Epic.

The fact that this has disappeared from the news is probably because Judy Faulkner, the owner/CEO/founder of Epic, probably called Texas Health Presbyterian and threatened to sue them for blaming their software. As soon as I saw that news article blaming Epic, I thought to myself "I'll bet Judy's gonna jump on that and squash it fast." And if it was due to Texas Health Presbyterian's configuration of Epic, and not to Epic itself, I don't blame her at all.

3 posted on 10/08/2014 7:55:49 AM PDT by scouter (As for me and my household... We will serve the LORD.)
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To: scouter

Yes. And ...

The spokesperson made reference to a flaw in the protocol for THIS patient. That moved my BS meter to the yellow zone. Epic has the Epic way and customers have to adapt to the Epic way. I cannot see how the protocol or any variance in it could vary for THIS patient.

Personally I think they misdiagnosed, perhaps based in part on a false history provided by the patient. After the missed diagnosis and a simple but wrong ICD 9/10 entry into Epic, the patient was sent home

IMHO


4 posted on 10/08/2014 8:06:03 AM PDT by Blueflag (Res ipsa loquitur: non vehere est inermus)
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To: Blueflag
The spokesperson made reference to a flaw in the protocol for THIS patient.

Doesn't change anything I've said. It is far more likely to be the effect of the way the hospital configured the system, or trained their staff, than it is to be an inherent bug in Epic. Period.

5 posted on 10/08/2014 8:08:57 AM PDT by scouter (As for me and my household... We will serve the LORD.)
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To: scouter

I was/ am agreeing with you. Hospital is trying not to admit to a missed diagnosis in my opinion. Or worse the docs knew and politics overruled.


6 posted on 10/08/2014 8:11:20 AM PDT by Blueflag (Res ipsa loquitur: non vehere est inermus)
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To: DFG
Duncan shows up and the WORST symptom he has is - NO MEDICAL INSURANCE. He is quickly given some pills and told to "go away".

The second time he shows up, they couldn't ignore the ebola.

7 posted on 10/08/2014 8:16:42 AM PDT by The Sons of Liberty (I want a Speaker who'll stick that pen and phone where no one but Reggie Love can find it!)
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To: scouter

Good post on the perils and potentials within EMR. Thanks for the inside baseball info since it’s going to be touching all of our lives, even if we don’t realize it.


8 posted on 10/08/2014 8:18:31 AM PDT by T-Bird45 (It feels like the seventies, and it shouldn't.)
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To: scouter
One of the reasons I really don't trust the MSM is because in my life I have had personal, direct knowledge of about 5 events that made national or international news, and what I witnessed, or otherwise had personal knowledge of, bore no resemblance to what was reported.

This is a universal experience. I wish more would draw the general lesson that it screams forth.

9 posted on 10/08/2014 8:21:10 AM PDT by Paine in the Neck (Socialism consumes EVERYTHING)
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To: The Sons of Liberty

Dallas Presby routinely deals with a lot of indigent/ no insurance patients. This guy probably was a walk in to the ED. They see hundreds of this every day. Part of their sucky patient portfolio.

If I read more I might know how he showed up at the hospital.


10 posted on 10/08/2014 8:24:09 AM PDT by Blueflag (Res ipsa loquitur: non vehere est inermus)
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To: Blueflag

Did they check all those people waiting in the ER when he arrived?


11 posted on 10/08/2014 8:26:40 AM PDT by The Sons of Liberty (I want a Speaker who'll stick that pen and phone where no one but Reggie Love can find it!)
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To: The Sons of Liberty

BTW - I just heard he died.


12 posted on 10/08/2014 8:27:24 AM PDT by The Sons of Liberty (I want a Speaker who'll stick that pen and phone where no one but Reggie Love can find it!)
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To: The Sons of Liberty

Tough to do for all because they only capture patient info during intake. Not visitors etc


13 posted on 10/08/2014 8:32:32 AM PDT by Blueflag (Res ipsa loquitur: non vehere est inermus)
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To: Blueflag

I see what you’re saying now.


14 posted on 10/08/2014 8:34:32 AM PDT by scouter (As for me and my household... We will serve the LORD.)
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To: scouter; Blueflag

Not sure if Michelle Malkin is MSM, but I understand your point.

Whether the issue is the lack of training or incompetence using the software, the info was not entered or not found in the software.(or if by an act of sabotage?)

The MSM is in question for reporting that the patient did tell the nurse to begin with. After all he lied to come here

Re: The spokesperson made reference to a flaw in the protocol for THIS patient.

Agree - this sounds very suspect.


15 posted on 10/08/2014 8:36:33 AM PDT by Whenifhow
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To: Paine in the Neck

>>. I wish more would draw the general lesson that it screams forth.

And take all the fun out of uninformed outrage?


16 posted on 10/08/2014 8:52:57 AM PDT by Lisbon1940
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To: Blueflag

Maybe ADT is not performed by Epic and transactions come through an interface manager that either is not setup correctly or dropped the transaction due to an error.


17 posted on 10/08/2014 9:07:43 AM PDT by Ray76 (We must destroy the Uniparty or be destroyed by them.)
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To: Ray76

Perhaps, but that would apply to every patient, not jus this one, no?

My point is I find it questionable to imply your EHR system, workflow, or protocol screwed up for ONE patient presenting with X set of symptoms and Y history.

I doubt the reporter here though could ask the right questions. Probably would go with HIPPA in a print article instead of HIPAA ;-)


18 posted on 10/08/2014 9:19:42 AM PDT by Blueflag (Res ipsa loquitur: non vehere est inermus)
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