Streamlining Pre-Op Anesthesia Workflows to Boost Efficiency & Safety

In the perioperative environment, increased efficiency and enhanced patient care go hand in hand. A streamlined anesthesia workflow can yield benefits for both, including improved communication among healthcare team members, reduced paperwork and staff stress, enhanced patient safety and comfort, shorter hospital stays, and lower readmittance rates.

An anesthesia information management system (AIMS) can streamline workflows across the perioperative environment. In this article, we focus on the pre-operative stage, where inefficiencies can lead to delays, increased paperwork, and stress. An effective AIMS can reduce these bottlenecks, setting the stage for a smoother surgical experience.

Solving common pre-operative inefficiencies and bottlenecks

The pre-operative period for anesthesia may start up to several weeks before surgery, the day before, or even on the day of surgery when the patient is in the pre-op holding area. During this period, the anesthesiologist meets with the patient, the medical history is taken, and a physical examination is performed. It ends in the operating room at the point when induction begins.

Key bottlenecks during this process include:

Paperwork overload: Pre-operative processes often involve a mountain of forms to fill out, including patient history, physical examination, pre-operative order sheets, anesthesia consent forms, and more. Entering all the information manually is time-consuming and prone to errors and may require patients to repeat information they have already provided, sometimes multiple times, leading to inconsistencies and frustration.

Solution: An Anesthesia Information Management System automates data entry by electronically capturing data from the Admission, Discharge, Transfer (ADT) system, clinical monitors and other sources. This reduces the risk of errors and ensures that patient information is accurately recorded, while saving time for clinicians and patients. An AIMS integrates with the electronic health record (EHR), providing seamless access to comprehensive patient data, including medical histories and lab results.

Siloed patient information: Data related to medical histories, allergies, medications, diagnostic imaging, cardiac and pulmonary function exams, and lab results may reside in multiple unconnected systems. This can lead to delays in anesthesia planning and poor coordination among surgical, anesthesia, and nursing departments, causing workflow disruptions and delays.

Solution: An AIMS integrates with the EHR and ADT, providing clinicians with access to each patient’s complete medical history in one place. This eliminates redundant tests and information gathering, and ensures crucial details are readily available. Integration with lab and imaging systems enables links to the results to be embedded in the AIMS, ensuring that all crucial information is readily available to all members of the clinical team.

Repetitive tasks: Pre-op staff are required to perform many repetitive tasks, such as generating pre-medication lists and various checklists, which are both time-consuming and prone to human error.

Solution: An anesthesia information management system automates many routine tasks like data entry and generating pre-operative checklists, significantly reducing the time and effort required.

Lack of standardization: Inconsistent procedures for pre-operative tasks can lead to inconsistencies. For example, pre-operative clearance requirements, the specific pre-operative tests ordered, and the instructions regarding pre-surgery fasting or medication management may vary depending on the surgeon or anesthesiologist. This may cause confusion or delays, and risks to patients.

Solution: The AIMS can implement standardized pre-operative procedures and checklists based on best practices. This creates consistency, reduces the risk of errors and ensures that all necessary steps are completed comprehensively, accurately and efficiently.

How does iMDsoft’s solution help?

MetaVision Anesthesia facilitates pre-op documentation and pre-anesthesia evaluation, enabling clinicians to:

• Quickly document the airway examination and review previous difficulties with anesthesia, co-morbidities and the planned anesthesia protocol
• Review perioperative risk scores, to assist with assessing patients
• Print pre-op visit reports and patient instructions for surgery

It also ensures that all pre-op data is accessible in the intra-op and post-op environments.

Key takeaways

• An anesthesia information management system (AIMS) automates data entry and integrates with the EHR, reducing paperwork, minimizing errors, and saving time for clinicians and patients.
• Consolidating cross-department patient information in an AIMS improves coordination between departments and prevents delays caused by siloed data.
• Automating repetitive pre-op tasks through an AIMS increases efficiency and reduces human error.
• Standardized pre-operative procedures implemented through an AIMS can ensure consistency, reduce risks, and enhance patient safety.

Conclusion

Implementing an anesthesia information management system (AIMS) in the pre-operative stage enhances both efficiency and patient safety. By automating data entry, consolidating patient information, and standardizing procedures, an AIMS reduces errors and delays, ensuring that the anesthesia team is fully equipped with all necessary information before surgery begins. This not only streamlines the workflow but also creates a more cohesive and prepared healthcare team, ultimately leading to better patient outcomes and a smoother perioperative experience.

FAQs

• How does an anesthesia information management system (AIMS) improve pre-operative efficiency?

  An AIMS automates data entry, integrates patient information, reduces repetitive tasks, and standardizes procedures. This leads to a smoother and faster pre-operative process and facilitates communication among clinical team members across the perioperative environments.

• How does an AIMS help with reducing human error during the pre-operative stage?

  An anesthesia information management system minimizes human error by automating critical processes such as data entry, checklist creation, and patient information management. By ensuring that all data is accurately recorded and standardized, an AIMS reduces the risk of manual errors, ensuring that the correct procedures are followed, and information is available to the surgical team whenever they need it.