Information Management

 

Program Officer  

The Division provides a wide range of support and resources to General Practices to increase and ehance the effective utilisation of information management systems.

Activities Include:

  • On site tailored Medical Director Training for GPs, Practice Nurses and Staff. 

  • Development of electronic clinical templates 

  • Advice and support regarding General Practice information management and system usage.

 

PEN Clinical Audit Tool 

The PEN Clinical Audit tool is a program that can analyse your Medical Director or Best Practice databases and present the information to you in an easy to view and manipulate graphical interface. It allows you to analyse both patient care and accuracy of data recorded. General Practice South has bought a division-wide licence for the product, so it is completely free to any practice that wants it. This replicates an initiative that is underway with several Divisions and practices in Victoria.

If you are running Medical Director or Best Practice and would like to have PEN installed or see a demonstration, please contact the program officer. Here are a few resources that contain further information about Pen and the company's ongoing relationship with Divisions of General Practice.

Version 2.2 Just Released !!! 

The latest version of the PEN tool became available on the 8th of September. It now has modules that show the last recorded date for some major immunisations (MDW only), namely: Influenza, Pneumococcal and Pertussis. Additionally there is information on what stage female patients are at with the Gardasil vaccination. There is also a summary report  that shows data recording percentages across the practice for common things like: gender, age, allergy, smoking, BP, HBA1c and others. Lastly, there is a cross tabulation report, which lets you select patients that appear on multiple graphs. For instance, you can generate a report of people who smoke, and have high blood pressure and have high cholesterol, and have diabetes.

This tool continues to become more and more useful. To download the latest version, simply go into the program and answer yes to the prompt.   

If you would like more information on Version 2.1, you can download the new manual or the release notes.

North East Valley division have an excellent collection of Pen resources, including work books and "How To" guides. Click here to check them out. 

Broadband

The Broadband for Health subsidy scheme finished on 31/12/2007. With the expiry of this subsidy,  practices may re-evaluate their internet connectivity options. Ideally Internet Service Providers will continue to make the same product available at a reasonable price, thus eliminating the need to change plans and avoiding the inconveniences that can come with such a change. If you are thinking about changing your internet plan, the Australian General Practice network (AGPN) has produced a connectivity guide for General Practice 

Practice Incentive Payment (PIP) IM/IT

In November 2006 the Government made changes to the IM/IT component of the PIP. These changes continued the emphasis on management of clinical information and General Practice data security and integrity. You can read about the November changes here. This continued emphasis on on security and record management matters is also reflected in the  RACGP 3rd Edition Standards.  

Public Key Infrastructure (PKI)

PKI is the encryption and security standard for sending medical information over the internet. The Royal Hobart Hospital utilises PKI for sending out Discharge notifications, and many other organisations in the health sector are also utilising PKI certificates to email clinical information.  You can read about PKI and apply for Certificates at the Medicare web site.

There are an increasing number of systems  that automate the process of sending and receiving secure email, as well as dealing with the message attachments that the email may contain. Conventional email programs can also be used for Secure email. Here are some resources that explain some of the common operations:

These resources help deal with some of the issues regarding receiving secure email using a conventional email client like Outlook Express and then importing these advices/reports into your clinical software. There is a project being run by General Practice Tasmania that automates these processes and aims to simplify the links between general practice and other healthcare providers, principally private specialists. You can read all about the Secci project here. 

Privacy Legislation

Commencing on 21 December 2001, the Privacy Amendment (Private Sector) Act 2000 (Cth), extends the operation of the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) to large private sector organisations and all health services providers. Schedule 3 of the amending Act sets out 10 National Privacy Principles (NPPs), which are the minimum privacy standards and legal requirements relating to the handling of personal information by private sector organisations.

Other Resources