In healthcare, there are certain constants that one can always expect. One example is the health assessment—which leads to a plan of care, or a “call to action,” if you will, for care providers. If you’re a patient, you aren’t always aware of the care plan, but it exists in virtually every healthcare setting. The care plan outlines the steps that must be followed in order to help you, the patient, progress through the various stages of your visit until care is no longer required.

The care plan is an essential element of patient care. It lets each nurse, physician, lab tech, resident—all those responsible for providing care—know what steps need to be taken to help improve each patient’s condition. The care plan is also a bane to nearly every nurse; the task of documenting the stages of care usually falls to nursing staff. This means that the nurse not only documents the work he does with patients, but is also supposed to keep up with what the physician and other care providers do for patients. The end result is all too often total dissolution of the care plan.

As a nurse, I understand the pains that go along with documenting patient care. As an expert in informatics, I understand that we could make the tasks of documenting much easier for our nurses and other providers. One solution is to remove the burden of documentation from nursing staff and automate the plan of care. This may not be as easy as it sounds.  Healthcare IT providers in many cases do not automate the process in a streamlined manner that addresses the information needs of the clinician.

Some ideas for automating the care plan:

1. Make sure caregivers never have to chase down information that has already been documented elsewhere
   • Manage patient status from the point of care
2. Don’t force staff to enter information that’s already been documented elsewhere
   • Integrate existing systems such as EMR, dietary services, pharmacy, imaging, nurse call and bed management
3. Eliminate delays in the information sharing process
   • This may mean going paperless, using wireless phones or implementing a real-time workflow automation solution
4.  Understand clearly the business need and workflows
   • Address this need during the contracting phase of your negotiations. Be sure that the vendor can meet the workflow needs and see the solution in use.

The results of an automated care plan are astounding, and have a tremendous impact on satisfaction, especially among nurses. Ultimately, automating the care plan cuts down on wasted time, and improves patient safety and satisfaction.