One of the trending focuses in hospital surgery departments is communication with patients and families. With COVID keeping family members out of the hospitals, communication is key to ensuring successful outcomes for surgery patients. Picis is helping by providing that communication through SmarTrack Next. SmarTrack Next is a web-based tracking system that allows many folks access to the tracking board without having to install OR Manager on a PC. The tracking application is still password protected but is accessed from any device. Just like SmarTrack, SmarTrack Next can have as many views with the population of patients, sorting and information configurable. The drag and drop of cases and staff make moving the schedule on the day of surgery a piece of cake. There is a new view called the timeline view that will show cases by room with the time of day across the top. This helps the board runners to know what is going on at the moment in the OR suites. There are colorful indicators that notify when a case is running behind and officially running late. This notification is a nice visual but can also notify staff and physicians via text or email that their case is running late. Another great communication tool is the ST Go app. The app is designed for physicians and staff to see what is going on in the OR. For physicians the app will let them see their patients and/or schedule for the day. The app also sends notifications for any changes to their patients. For example – if a patient’s case is moved from OR Room 2 to OR Room 4 the app will send a notification to the physician to give them up to date information on their patients. The texting is not limited to staff and physicians. SmarTrack Next can automatically update family members during the surgical journey. For example – when the patient is moved to the OR and the circulator documents the Patient Time In, a text can automatically be sent to family that their loved one is in the OR. On top of all those features there is also a Family Portal. The portal allows friends and family that are not able to be at the hospital access to updates on their loved one during surgery. An email is sent to those individuals the patient designates and they set up a user ID and password for the portal with ONLY access to their loved one. Once the surgery is complete their access is inactivated.
These features are just the tip of the iceberg of SmarTrack Next. If you want to see more, feel free to reach out to me at tsullivan@picis.com for a demo of SmarTrack Next.
About the Author
Theresa Sullivan, Director, Sales Support
Theresa has worked for Picis for 15 years and is currently the Director of Sales Support. With Picis, Theresa has implemented the Picis solutions across a variety of commercial and VA facilities, functioned as a Clinical Consultant in Sales, managed the Picis Reference Program and supported customers as a Senior Strategic Consultant in professional services. Before coming to Picis, Theresa was the Clinical System Administrator at a large medical center in Houston, Texas.
