Southern Health-Santé Sud will be implementing a new Emergency Department Information System (EDIS) at its regional health centres, Bethesda Regional Health Centre in Steinbach, Boundary Trails Health Centre in Winkler and Portage District General Hospital in Portage la Prairie.
Designed to assist in managing timely patient care, EDIS is an electronic patient tracking and clinical documentation system which will connect our three regional health centres to other sites in the province that are connected with EDIS. The system will be used to track and monitor patient activity and care in the emergency departments. System features will include the ability to track patients through their journey, manage workflow and enhance communication, supporting timely, safe and quality patient care.
A wait-time display board will be located in patient waiting areas, displaying information such as the number of patients waiting and the length of time most patients have been waiting. These wait times will begin to appear on the wait-time display board in late March 2017, as it will take some time for the EDIS system to collect the information required to calculate wait times for patient visits.
Southern Health-Santé Sud notes that quality patient care and safety continues to be a top priority for emergency staff. As with all new systems, there is an expected learning curve and patients may experience an increase in wait times as staff become familiarized with this new process.
EDIS was originally introduced 10 years ago at the St. Boniface Hospital in Winnipeg and has been implemented in all acute care centres in Winnipeg as well as in Brandon and Selkirk.
