Alberta Netcare
Alberta Netcare is a successfully deployed single province-wide EMR system in Canada. It was developed in order to be a central repository of clinical data that is produced anywhere within the province of Alberta [1].
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Background
Alberta Netcare holds a secure lifetime record of key health information, and is a critical reference tool for Albertan health care professionals. Thus, it is not a patient's full health or medical record, but a supplement to patient care. The Alberta Netcare system captures several key data elements from health service providers around Alberta for inclusion in a patient's provincial electronic health record. These key elements include:
- personal demographic information as a unique identifier
- prescribed dispensed drugs
- known allergies and intolerances
- immunizations
- laboratory test results
- diagnostic imaging reports
- other medical reports
Information Management
The information is then provided through Alberta Netcare EHR Portal for physicians, nurses, pharmacists and other authorized health service providers. It includes several decision support tools including:
- drug to drug and drug to allergy interaction alerts to avoid prescriptions that conflict
- a database of all available drugs and their common dosages
- links to information support such as clinical guidelines from the Alberta Medical Association
Information is maintained by two methods:
- Primarily, information is automatically accessed and captured from the existing electronic data systems of pharmacies, labs, diagnostic services and Alberta Health Services facilities. This means that this information is not re-keyed or re-entered by anyone, it is gathered from source systems.
- Additionally, some information can be entered directly into a record by an Alberta Netcare authorized health service provider.
Patient Identifier
Electronic health records created and maintained by Alberta Netcare are indexed by a unique patient identifier, the Provincial Health Number. The PHN is assigned to a person who is eligible to receive services from Alberta Health and Wellness. This value is synonymous with the Unique Lifetime Identifier (ULI) assigned by Person Directory. (1)
Products
Alberta Netcare EHR Portal is comprised of several EHR products that have been developed to meet regional needs and the requirements of health service providers. These products are linked together to comprise the province-wide Alberta Netcare EHR Portal.
The Alberta Netcare EHR product offerings are:
Alberta Netcare EHR Portal is the enhanced version of Alberta Netcare Portal 2004* This release provides access to the full range of currently-available patient health information:
- personal demographic information helps to uniquely identify each patient
- prescribed dispensed drugs
- known allergies and intolerances
- immunizations
- laboratory test results
- diagnostic imaging reports
- other medical reports
System to System Version
Alberta Netcare EHR Portal is also available in a "system to system" (S2S) version that integrates directly with some physician Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems* S2S allows data to be seamlessly accessed and transferred between these local systems and the provincial electronic health record*
Alberta Netcare Portal 2004
Alberta Netcare Portal 2004 provides access to basic patient information:
- personal demographics to make it easy to identify and find patients
- prescribed dispensed drugs, as well as known allergies and intolerances
- some laboratory results
References
- Pharmaceutical Information Network Data Set, http://www.health.alberta.ca/documents/HISCA-Pharmaceutical-Info.pdf
- Alberta Netcare
