The Fred IT Group has been nominated by the Australian Digital Health Agency to lead a new medicines safety project to explore the impact of digital health records in improving patient medication safety.
The project is one of 15 digital health test beds announced this week by the Minister for Health, Greg Hunt. It will investigate the impact of digital health systems in supporting patient safety and clinical decision-making as patients move between the care of their community pharmacy and hospital settings.
According to Fred CEO and pharmacist Paul Naismith, digital health systems can provide significant value to clinical and patient support as patients move through these settings.
“Hospital, community pharmacy and GP settings have evolved with different clinical systems, which means that they have not necessarily spoken to each other,” he said.
“This has meant that real-time medications management and reconciliation is not necessarily visible to all parties as patients move between these different care settings, with concerning implications for clinical decision-making and patient safety.
“Fred believes that digital systems have a fundamental role to play in bridging gaps such as these in patient medicines history between different pharmacy settings. We’re delighted to be involved in the process of gathering evidence about the real impact that digital health records have in strengthening medications management and patient outcomes.”
Fred, together with partners including the Pharmacy Guild of Australia and Monash University, will measure the impact of digital medications reconciliation on patient safety and improving access to clinical decision-making data, using information from Fred’s existing clinical tool, MedView, together with the My Health Record.
