The Australian Digital Health Agency has added an aged care transfer summary to My Health Record and will work with software providers to incorporate the product into their platforms.
The transfer summary will include the reason for transfer, the person’s health status, and their current medication.
The aim of the summary is to ensure that aged care transfer information is available at hospitals when residents are admitted, and in line with recommendation 66 of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety to improve the transition between residential aged care and hospital care.
The Agency ran a "discovery project" between 30 August 2022 and 05 June 2023 on the hospital to RACF discharge process, resulting in two reports: a current state of analysis and a final report on recommendations of areas for action.
The Agency is also developing discharge summaries for when the resident goes back to residential aged care, and integrating My Health Record with My Aged Care to ensure aged care assessments are available when residents are in hospital.
Laura Toyne, ADHA Branch Manager for National Program Delivery said at a Department of Health and Aged Care webinar that 35% of aged care facilities are signed up to My Health Record, with a target of 70% within six months.
Aged care transfer summaries will "enable... the digital transfer of information, the collation and the transfer of information to follow a patient as they move from a residential aged care facility into a hospital for emergency or non-emergency care,” Laura said, according to a report in Pulse IT.
"It’s quite a significant development in being able to support the clinical care of someone as they move to hospital.
"We’ve worked really closely with clinicians, aged care providers and others to develop and support and identify what those critical bits of information would be, how they come together, how they’ll be collated, and how they will move to be accessed at the hospital."
