Jeff Patton, MD, CEO, TENNESSEE ONCOLOGY
It has been a busy sports month for the Patton family. I was fortunate enough to visit Ashley in NYC during a business trip and we caught a good dinner and watched a few March Madness basketball games. The NCAA basketball tournament is my favorite sports event of the year so I love March. Evan, Mary and I watched quite a few games together. Evan and I “cheated on basketball” and made it to a couple Predators’ games as well.
This month’s quote:
“Forget perfect on the first try. In the face of frustration, your best tool is a few deep breaths, and remembering that you can do anything once you’ve practiced two hundred times. Seriously.”
– Andrea Buchanan
I thought this an appropriate quote as we embark upon our EMR conversion. There will certainly be frustrations but the more prepared i.e. training and practice, the easier the transition will be. Countless hours have been logged in preparation and planning by volunteers, end users, nursing, pharmacy, management and physicians. Again, thank you to all who have invested time in setting up this gigantic project for best success.
The new EMR, OncoEMR, has significant advantages over our current system. First, it is cloud based so it should prove to be a lot faster… good-bye hourglass!!! Also because it is cloud based, you can access from anywhere that has Internet access. Workflow will be much improved for both front office and providers. Front office, nurses and physicians will all be very happy that we will have electronic signature so no more signing paper orders!
These are just a few high level advantages. There are many more intrinsic features that will improve our ability to demonstrate the value of care we provide to our patients as we continue to be leaders in the ever-evolving health care arena. Please join me in being diligent and taking time to train and be ready for the April/Chattanooga and June/Middle TN go-live dates!
