Clinical Pathways, a nursing-centric program that improves tracking of patient outcomes during hospital stays, isn’t just for nurses. The program also provides greater visibility of your patient’s progress toward service-line accepted patient goals.
To start a patient on Clinical Pathways, use the Nurse to Initiate Clinical Pathway order, frequently part of your post-op order set. This triggers a BestPractice Advisory to start Pathways.
You can also use the Pathway Summary Report for a snapshot of how a patient is doing, including any outcome issues.
Clinical Pathways started in May with an HMH colorectal surgery pilot and has expanded to include colorectal and hip/knee/spine patients systemwide. A second pilot, for CABG patients at HMH, will start on Nov. 18. Additional rollouts for heart failure are planned in early 2020.
Clinical Pathways includes:
- Streamlined documentation and decision-making workflows through service-line accepted patient goals and escalation plans.
- Standardized processes and streamlined workflows that reduce variations in care, unnecessary interventions and repetitive documentation.
- A high-level view of patients’ orders, care plans, assessments and outcomes.
- One screen to identify a patient’s daily goals and view relevant documentation in their flowsheet.
