The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre Goes Live with Kainos's Evolve? EMR

London - February 4^th, 2013 - Thriving technology company Kainos has announced that The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre NHS Foundation Trust has gone live with its flagship Evolve? electronic medical record (EMR) solution. The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, based in Wirral, Merseyside, is one of the largest cancer centres in the UK. It began working with 100% digital patient records for new patients of three consultant oncologists at the end of November, following a major upgrade of a broader electronic patient record (EPR) system, Maxims, in June 2012. Kainos has embedded Evolve EMR within the EPR system to provide clinicians with comprehensive access to electronic records at the point of need, and to prepare for exchanging content securely with remote partners such as GPs and referring hospitals. Dr Richard Griffiths, a consultant medical oncologist is the lead clinician for information management and technology (IM&T) at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre. Along with two colleagues he began using Kainos Evolve to create and process active patient records on November 26. These already number several hundred. Earlier in the year Kainos migrated more than 750,000 legacy correspondence documents to the Evolve EMR system, where they can now be searched intelligently and accessed securely from multiple locations by authorised staff. The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre has also established its own scanning bureau on site, following comprehensive advice and assistance from Kainos. The state-of-the-art facility has already been used to convert hundreds of thousands of paper-based record into digital form so that they can be spontaneously available to medical staff. 'The fact that I can readily access case notes if I'm not in the clinic is a big improvement in managing patient flow and dealing with issues as they arise,' says Dr Griffiths. 'I can access patient records even if I'm off site too via a secure portal.' One of the main goals of the project, in addition to reducing operating costs, is to enhance patient care by freeing up more of clinicians' time from house-keeping tasks. 'Currently I spend about 60% of time with patients, and around 40% on admin and documents,' Dr Griffiths reports. 'The aim is to get this ratio to 80:20 or even 90:10.' The current 'go live' milestone is the first phase in a gradual roll-out of the Evolve EMR system: the Trust is keen to create internal evangelists who can help promote the benefits of the solution and pass on best practices to other clinicians. 'We also plan to review our processes in the light of the new system to maximise the additional benefits we can get out of it,' Dr Griffiths says. Dr Griffiths is particularly keen to embrace full mobile capabilities now that Kainos Evolve is available on the iPad. 'Tablet devices to me seem to be the natural replacement for the case notes as we move to a paperless environment and I am very keen to see the functionality of Evolve viewed through a device such as an iPad,' he says. Another key goal will be to enable electronic information exchange with partner service providers, such as GPs and referring hospitals. 'There is a lot we can do with this technology, beyond the immediate project,' Tom Poulter, Head of Information Management & Technology at the Trust concludes. 'Evolve is intuitive and easy to use. We have had a good response from our clinical staff, which gives us an excellent base to build on. They particularly like the 'timeline' view which enables them to build a chronological view of documents and see the latest information first." Kainos beat six other technology providers to win the EMR contract with Clatterbridge.