Real Time ADT Alerts Improve NICU Care
By Katie Wike, contributing writer
Real time alerts are improving care and reducing readmissions for the hospitals smallest patients.
Real-time clinical alerts of admission - or ADT Alerts - are improving care and reducing readmissions for Rhode Island’s smallest patients, those in the NICU. According to the government blog, Health IT Buzz, these alerts have “improved outcomes and measurable reductions in 30-day hospital readmissions, duplicate testing, and fewer emergency department visits that result in a patient being admitted to the hospital.”
ADT Alerts notify hospital staff when a patient is admitted, discharged, or transferred. These alerts are sent to the patient’s primary care physician to notify them of the patient’s condition. Once alerted to a patient’s status, care providers can take action including but not limited to scheduling follow-ups, ensuring the patient understands discharge instructions, or calling the emergency department to recommend a patient to another care delivery setting such as a skilled nursing facility.
According to Fierce Health IT, parents can opt to enroll their newborns in CurrentCare Alerts, which give PCPs prompt notification of when one of their enrolled infants has an ED visit or a hospital admission. For example, “In a recent case one of their infants was brought to the ED by her mother due to concern the infant might be wheezing. The ED did not find any respiratory issues of concern and the infant was discharged home,” writes Health IT Buzz.
“In response to this event the team brought the infant into their Neonatal Follow-up Clinic the following day for further evaluation and was able to determine the infant was experiencing reflux, causing the infant to cough and appear to have labored breathing. They initiated treatment and the infant has done well at home since.”
“Hospital alerts have facilitated continuity of care for our patients. Our goal has been to contact all of our patients who have been in the hospital or the ER within 24 hours,” says Dr. Martin Kerzer, a family physician at Associates in Primary Care Medicine in R.I. “With hospital alerts we are approaching that goal. One of my complex patients was discharged from the hospital and since alerts are received in real time, my nurse care manager was able to contact the patient immediately after discharge, as well as speak to the patient’s visiting nurse and arrange for her follow up care.”