Thakkis

We never have had a "one click" option for NKDA or No Meds Taken. We have to go into the tracker, into the private tracker, select the patient, click document, click meds/Allergy History, click add meds, click No Meds Taken/NKDA, click file, click confirm, and click Go Back. Seems like a lot of work for NKDA.

Do you know why they went to this system? JCAHO is looking for total computer charting and this is one of the companies that can interface a total computer chart through several depts: lab, pharm, etc. That's why it's not going away: JCAHO wants it. The cost just seals your fate. It's a JCAHO thing. They want computer generated stats on everything for tracking purposes. It seems like a case of enhancing the administrative process at the sake of quality patient care.

You're seeing these probably for the same reason as all of rural America is seeing them. Methamphetamine. It's huge in the South and causes all sorts of MRSA lesions.

Let's see, "Jaw clicking" comes to mind, as does "I felt bad today, but feel fine now, just curious what it was." Yes, we do have to treat these people by law. We cannot refuse treatment to anyone that "think's they are having an emergency, no matter now minor". We can however triage them to be seen sometime in the next millenium. The people who come to be seen for such things are generally on medicaid (Medi-cal where I come from) and so they aren't paying for it, we are.

Is anyone here using Meditech for their ER charting? My hospital just went to it a few weeks ago and we all hate it. Where it used to take a flick of the wrist to write "none" if somebody didn't take any meds it now takes ten clicks of a mouse. Our docs refuse to use it, so they're using our old paper system. The floors can't use it yet so we have to print out mountains of reports to send to them, which they don't know how to read. Our patients hate it because our standard waiting room times increased from two to five hours. Our time in the ER has incresed from three to about ten hours. It's so frustrating. Our administrator's response to our concerns is "We payed $7 million for this system, we're going to use it." It seems broken to me, but it's a huge company with clients across the world. Can it really be as bad as we think it is? Please, any response would be great.