How a Health System Optimized EHR Documentation For Telehealth

July 06, 2020 - Since COVID-19 swept through the Sunshine State, Nemours Children’s Health System has had a 2,200 percent increase in telehealth demand. The hospital saw roughly 30,000 telehealth visiting in April, compared to 800 at the same time last year. But that success came with one immense hurdle: pivoting the EHR documentation process.

While the hospital has had telehealth infrastructure built into its EHR for quite some time, Dr. David West, medical director of health informatics at Nemours, said the team needed to “activation energy” to adapt to the telehealth increase.

“But when it was met with COVID, it forced the situation. We wanted to make sure that we continue to have continuity of care,” West told EHRIntelligence in an interview. “We were fortunate to really have the infrastructure already in place to allow that to happen pretty quickly.”