Ethitec's Tiara9 awarded NHS Spine certification10 November 2014 Ethitec's EPR system, Tiara9, has successfully completed the certification process for compatibility with the NHS electronic appointment booking systems, having run without incident at its ‘First of Type’ site at Frimley Park Hospital. The certification gives healthcare provider organisations seeking NHS Any Qualified Provider (AQP) contracts access to a new EPR solution that meets the criteria of enabling appointments to be booked electronically by GPs using NHS Choose & Book and its planned replacement, the e-Referral System. Ethitec worked closely with the Health and Social Care Information Centre to achieve compliance with the NHS Spine, the infrastructure that supports the NHS national systems and services. Ethitec’s Managing Director, Simon Taylor, commented: “We are delighted that Tiara9 has completed the process smoothly. Its accreditation now opens up an effective and affordable solution for AQPs to enable direct referrals from GPs, and we look forward to being able to offer more functionality as it develops into the new e-Referral System.” Commenting on the experience of piloting live running with Choose & Book, Val Sharples, Head of Occupational Therapy Services at Frimley Park, said: “The whole process has gone extremely smoothly: there is evidence of patients booking, cancelling and changing appointments without any fuss. As hoped, it’s made it quicker and easier for them to access our services. “From our perspective, it has helped standardise the information that comes through from GPs for each referral, and it also improves the information available to GPs, such as whether the patient takes up their appointment or further follow-up takes place.” The Tiara9 system is used throughout the Occupational Therapy, Physiotherapy, Dietetics, and Speech and Language teams at Frimley Park Hospital, and the accreditation of Tiara9 is expected to enable these services to take on more AQP contracts. Val Sharples explained, “The driver for us in becoming the First of Type site was that our physiotherapy service has an AQP contract with Hampshire for musculoskeletal services — a requirement of which was for us to enable automated appointment referrals via Choose & Book. It’s likely that other services will now look to publish appointments for treatments such as hand therapy, hand splinting and neuro-rehabilitation. “Having Choose & Book in place certainly opens up more possibilities in terms of referrals and, as the solution evolves into the new e-Referral System, we expect more functionality to follow.“ Ethitec is one of the first independent software providers to complete the five-stage e-RS/Choose & Book certification process. The NHS e-RS service is planned to go live next spring, when it will replace the Choose & Book system currently in operation. e-RS/ Choose & Book roll-out is key to the vision of offering patients a choice of place, date and time for their first appointment, and of eliminating paper processes around the management of appointments and patient records. Source: Ethitec
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