Gorkem Sevinc, Presenter: Nothing to Disclose

Paul G. Nagy PhD, Abstract Co-Author: Nothing to Disclose

John Eng MD, Abstract Co-Author: Nothing to Disclose

The Rad Assistant EMR aggregator is associated with a very high level of satisfaction because its design and technological implementation have focused on usability and reliability.

Competent radiology practice requires clearly understanding an exam’s reason and the patient’s pertinent clinical information. An EMR should fulfill this need. However, initial use of our institution’s EMR by radiologists was nonexistent because the user interface mimicked a patient chart and required too many mouse clicks to access relevant information. In 2001, we developed Rad Assistant, a radiologist-centric user interface to our institution's EMR database. Rad Assistant is an application designed to minimize the number of mouse clicks and keystrokes required for operation.

The main reasons for Rad Assistant's high level of satisfaction are reliability and usability. Its high reliability is tied to its connection with the EMR database. The EMR is a critical application to the institution, so institutional resources are spent to maintain very high database availability. The distributed Java platform reduces single points of failure. Rad Assistant contains defensive programming-code that maintains operation despite unforeseen circumstances.High usability is due to Rad Assistant's design goal of minimizing mouse clicks and keystrokes. The user interface was designed by a practicing radiologist with unfiltered input from all users. The result is an intuitive application that requires no training. Rad Assistant transparently combines key documents from radiology and emergency department systems, eliminating additional logins. Seamless integration with report generation and image viewing have been implemented.

All Rad Assistant usage is electronically logged. The application has been used 6.5 million times in its 10-year history. Annual usage has grown linearly, with 800,000 accesses in 2011, almost 2 for each exam performed. Unplanned outages are rare and almost exclusively related to the EMR database rather than the application itself. On departmental IT surveys, Rad Assistant has received the highest ratings of user satisfaction, even higher than PACS and RIS.

Sevinc, G, Nagy, P, Eng, J, Design of an EMR Aggregation Tool.  Radiological Society of North America 2012 Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting, November 25 - November 30, 2012 ,Chicago IL. http://archive.rsna.org/2012/12037564.html