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Description:
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The HELP (Health Evaluation through Logical Processes) System is a complete knowledge based hospital information system. It supports not only the routine application of an HIS including ADT, order entry/charge capture, pharmacy, radiology, nursing documentation, ICU monitoring, but also supports a robust decision support function.
The decision-support system has been actively incorporated into the functions of the routine HIS applications. Decision support has been used to provide
- alert and reminders,
- critiquing processes
- patient diagnosis, patient management suggestions and clinical protocols.
A typical example for the alerting program is a subsystem, which monitors common laboratory results and detects and alerts for potentially life-threatening abnormalities in the data acquired. The HELP system captures results from the clinical laboratory through an interface to a dedicated laboratory information system (LIS). The results are collected and returned to the HELP system for storage in the clinical record as soon as they are collected and validated in the LIS. A critiquing tool is embedded into the blood ordering program designed to ascertain the reason for every transfusion and to compare the reason to strict criteria specific to the type of transfusion planned. Patient management and medical decision-making can be supported by a number of applications residing in the HELP system. The first is an application that evaluates patient data to detect adverse drug events (ADE). This ADE subsystem continuously monitors patients for the occurrence of an adverse drug event. The system does so by inspecting the patient data entered at the bedside for signs of rash, changes in respiratory rate, heart rate, hearing, mental status, seizure, anaphylaxis, diarrhea and fever. In addition data from the clinical lab, the pharmacy and the medication charting applications are analyzed to determine possible ADEs. Another application in use in the LDS hospital is designed to recognize nosocomial, or hospital acquired infections. The computerized surveillance system used in the hospital relies on data from a variety of sources (microbiology lab, nurse charting, chemistry lab, surgery, pharmacy) to diagnose nosocomial infections. Once a day a report is produced detailing the computer suggestions. The third application is a computerized assistant that informs and advises physicians as they undertake the complex task of determining how to treat a patient with possible infection. The “antibiotic assistant” recommends the antibiotic(s) most likely to produce the optimal benefit in this patient with the least risk and expense. HELP Hospital Information System is operating in the LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City. Recently, principal software components of the HELP system have also been installed in 21 other hospitals.
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