Joint Commission Allows Texting Orders: Now What?

It's safe to say every hospital has a need to text orders to some degree. Now that the Joint Commission has reversed their position stated in a FAQ page in 2011 and said texting orders is now okay (downloadable pdf), where do we go from here? There have always been scenarios where caregivers need new or revised orders to address a patient care issue more quickly than the typical frequency of physician rounding and sitting down to interact with the CPOE system. Common use cases include the need to change alarm parameters to better fit the patient and reduce non-actionable alarms, interventional orders in response to a patient's clinical deterioration, or a response to new diagnostic data. Achieving excellent patient outcomes while keeping a lid on length of stays require effective and timely staff responses to improvements or deterioration in a patient's condition. This is why verbal orders arose, and why texting also became popular. This post provides a penetrating review the commission's reversal of their texting orders ban. Two key considerations will underly this review: product requirements and what requirements providers must meet to use a secure messaging app for orders. While the commission says their concern about texting orders revolves around privacy and security, many of the requirements and advice laid out in the Update: Texting Orders has nothing to do with privacy and security but rather workflow and patient safety. Let's start with the commission's basi...
Source: Medical Connectivity Consulting - Category: Information Technology Authors: Tags: Messaging & Orchestration Source Type: blogs