Case Study
Improve Quality of Care and During Patient Transfers
As patients move across care settings, particularly when multiple provider networks are involved, sharing patient records is crucial to improving patient outcomes. As an example, a 70-year-old patient was transferred from a small community hospital to a tertiary care center for hip surgery. The accepting facility received the patient, however none of the patient’s clinical documentation was included in the transfer. A request was made for her medical record, which was delivered via fax and some data in her record was barely legible. When in surgery the next day, the patient’s blood pressure rose to the point of impacting the ability of her organs to function properly. After the transfer to the intensive care unit, her blood pressure dropped rapidly, a serious post-surgery complicat