Mobile medication administration in Central Finland
The Medanets Medication solution has been used by our Uranus customers since 2018. The solution is now available to our Lifecare customers as well, and the Central Finland Health Care District was the first to implement it at Hospital Nova.
The goal of the mobile medication administration in the Central Finland Health Care District is to increase the safety of pharmacotherapy, promote the closed loop medication process in pharmacotherapy practices and enable faster medication entries. The Health Care District plans to implement the mobile medication administration in all the Hospital Nova wards already using the Medanets app for other purposes, with a few exceptions.
Medanets Medication
With the Medanets app, the nurse can access information concerning the patient’s pharmacotherapy while being right next to the patient and right before administering the medication. All medication-related information is fetched in real time from the electronic health record. The entry on administering medication is immediately added to the pharmacotherapy system.
Real-time documentation of pharmacotherapy:
- enables clinical decision-making based on real-time information
- prevents double administration of medication
- helps assess the impact of the patient’s pharmacotherapy
Preparation and proactive measures
Before it could implement the Medanets Medication solution, the Central Finland Health Care District had to make changes to its processes. There were some major changes to the daily entry activities, but they enabled a safer process as well as the deployment of the mobile app as part of the process.
- Previously, the medication administrations were documented to care descriptions (hoidonseuranta), whereas now it is documented to the Lifecare medication section. The medication administrations made with the Medanets app are also documented there.
- More detailed instructions were provided on checking the patients’ medication records and prescriptions to keep the medication records up to date.
- The new guidelines require that medication administrations should be made whenever a medication is administered. The benefits include safer pharmacotherapy, more detailed assessment of the patient’s medication and improved legal protection for the staff as the patient’s pharmacotherapy can be verified in real time.
Deployments launched at a deliberate pace
The first three-week pilot was launched in February 2022, after which the solution was deployed in one ward per week until the nursing strike halted the deployments. In the rest of the wards, the deployment was carried out over the course of a week.
A deliberate pace in the deployment allows us to closely teach and train each person and ensure everyone understands the new policy. Of course, the deployment can also be carried out faster or everywhere all at once; however, in that case, the user base must have good skills and/or the unit must be able to offer sufficient support.
Jenni Puoliväli, Project Manager, Central Finland Health Care District
According to Puoliväli, the nurses have found the medication feature easy to use and the learning process has been efficient. Puoliväli mentions that the users’ skill levels vary; some would have known how to use the feature even without any training, while others needed a longer time to learn.
Nurses’ experiences
The feedback from the nurses has been positive as they witness the benefits of the solution in their daily work:
If you already know how to use the Medanets app, learning the medication feature won’t take long.
The medication feature is logical, and I particularly like the option of thoroughly examining the prescriptions.
The option to see the medication that can be administered as needed is a great tool, and it’s easy to check when medication was last administered to the patient and what medication can be administered while standing next to the patient.
The new process has also had its challenges. Some issues have already been solved, while others require more time to properly integrate the new practices with the workflows.
Making entries on the administration of all the patient’s medication can be a challenging practice from time to time.
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