Lehigh Valley taps virtual scribe to improve patient, provider experience

Lehigh Valley Health Network, with eight hospital campuses in seven eastern Pennsylvania counties, has selected IKS Health to aid in a transformation of its delivery system—including an effort to reduce provider burnout.

“Although the healthcare industry faces a myriad of challenges, we’re meeting them head-on to support our physicians and patients,” says Michael Rossi, MD, chief physician executive and president of Lehigh Valley Physician Group. “We are excited to further identify and explore ways to truly drive innovation with the interest in recruiting the best talent to the area.”

As a first step, 50 providers will start using IKS’ Scribble technology by December. Scribble is a virtual scribe solution that pairs physicians with a Virtual Physician Partner.

A virtual scribe listens to and documents the encounter in real-time and enters notes, codes and other data into the patient chart while the doctor focuses on the patient. This enables the physician to better engage with patients, freeing up schedules for more patient interaction, additional visits, and cutting documentation by up to two hours a day.


Here are more health IT implementations and go-lives reported during the past week:

· Greenville Health System and Palmetto Health in South Carolina have combined to become Prisma Health and are picking up additional technologies such as a mobile wayfinding platform to help patients and visitors find their way across the health system serving 1.2 million patients. The platform from Gozio Health offers step-by-step directions anywhere in the delivery system. Initial launch of the platform included the eight hospitals, seven parking decks and 200 satellite clinics of the former Greenville Health System. Expanded coverage now extends to the former Palmetto Health and Tuomey Health locations for navigation of the entire delivery system.

· Nurse practitioners at Jersey Shore University Medical Center in New Jersey are live on the CareInform mobile app from Vocera Communications to record personalized discharge instructions and create educational resources for patients with ischemic stroke, and readmission rates have fallen by 50 percent. “I think when patients hear discharge instructions and teach-back sessions that include their own voices and the voice of their nurses, it helps improve accountability and compliance,” says Jackie Dwyer, R.N., stroke program manager at the hospital.

· Medical imaging and cyber security company Sectra will install its enterprise imaging PACS and vendor neutral archive throughout Vanderbilt Health in Nashville. The Epic Radiant radiology information system and the Epic Cupid cardiovascular information system will be integrated with Sectra to give physicians a full patient overview on a single workstation to allow for scalability and growth of the delivery system. The multi-year contract also will include advanced visualization tools, teaching file software, breast imaging PACS for mammography workflow, orthopedic pre-operative planning tools, business analytics and resident workflow.

· Baptist Health South Florida is live on consumer access experience software from Kyruus to enable English- and Spanish- speaking patients to search for providers in their native language. Patients also have access to provider profiles. “To stand out with the digital experience we knew we needed an integrated strategy aimed at simplifying access to care,” says Christine Kotler, marketing and communications director. “We’re excited to launch this suite of enhancements to enable patients to learn about and access our services in a way that aligns with their preferred means of engagement.” But, with 60 percent of patients still booking appointments by phone, Baptist Health will also implement the vendor’s ProviderMatch for Access Centers software in its call center.