BlackBerrys adding to docs' bedside manner

GP out-of-hours service Northern Doctors Urgent Care (NDUC) is looking into adding panic buttons and barcode-reading functionality to its handhelds following a mobile electronic records rollout that could save the organisation £100,000 per year.

NDUC provides out-of-hours care for around one million patients in Northumberland, North Tyneside, South Tyneside and Newcastle. Until last year, its 350 clinicians were forced to rely on an outdated mobile records system that only provided read-only access to a cut-down summary of patients' records.

The system was also tied to clinicians' vehicles - stepping out of the car meant no more access to records.

Last October, the organisation decided to opt for a rollout of a system from Astute that would give two-way access to patient records through BlackBerry devices - meaning doctors can take the records right to patients' bedsides.

The system, rolled out last Christmas, has been a boon to the organisation according to its CIO, cutting risk and giving clinicians a better system.

"It's been well received by our doctors and I'll tell you now they're hard people to please," John Harrison told the Wireless Enterprise Symposium in Orlando.

The drivers who take clinicians to appointments also benefit from having less paperwork as they no longer have to pass on messages to drivers. They're also trained to provide support for the BlackBerry system to the doctors on the road, which Harrison said has helped doctors take up the system.

There's also likely to be a hard ROI benefit, as doctors become more efficient by being able to update their notes on the drives between patient visits.

"Initially, it was about patient safety and good patient care. Even if we were never going to make any money, we would have done it anyway but we reckon we'll save around £100,000 a year," Harrison told silicon.com.

The organisation is now looking into extending the functionality of the system to include panic button functionality, whereby clinicians running into trouble could use the BlackBerry to alert their driver or others to their predicament.

Another potential addition to the system could come in the form of a barcode scanning of medicines - NDUC doctors carry drugs with them on visits and by photographing and scanning the barcodes on the packs, the organisation could track which drugs have been dispensed to help with both stock taking and record keeping.