AHRQ awarded Dr. Mollie Cummins, Associate Professor of Nursing and Biomedical Informatics at the University of Utah, College of Nursing $1.2 million to study the health information exchange process between Emergency Departments (ED) and Poison Control Centers. (PCC)
Poisoning is the second leading cause of unintentional injury death in the U.S and healthcare providers are dependent upon U.S. Poison Control Centers (PCC) to deliver optimal care. PCCs and Emergency Departments (ED) are dependent on communicating by phone but in some cases can lead to miscommunication, data loss, and error.
Health information exchanges, would help support PCCs and ED efforts to help poisoned patients during routine situations and in disaster scenarios when telephone-based communication can be fragile.
Currently, there is a lack of process models and informatics tools (standards and software) for PCC-ED HIEs. Plus there is no available information on the clinical effects when implementing this type of provider-to-provider health information exchange and the effects on workflow and patient care.
The specific aim for this study is to develop a model process for HIE plus develop and implement informatics tools supporting EDs and PCCs. The next step is to evaluate the effects of the model HIE process and informatics tools on workflow, communication efficiency, and utilization.
For more information, go to mollie.cummins@utah.edu.