Saving Time and Improving Quality of Care With the Help of an EHR.

The former Director of Health Services at The Terraces of San Joaquin Gardens in Fresno, California has moved on from their role since this article was published. 

I am the director of finance at The Terraces of San Joaquin Gardens, an American Baptist Homes of the West (ABHOW) community located in Fresno, California. I’ve been with the organization for over 14 years and was part of the team when we first transitioned to PointClickCare, our electronic health record (EHR), almost 10 years ago. It seems like a lifetime ago, but working with PointClickCare is just a part of who we are and what we do now.

When I first started in my role at The Terraces of San Joaquin Gardens, our team heavily relied on paper for our day-to-day tasks. Now, we are a completely electronic-based organization and PointClickCare is the electronic health record platform that is used across our entire organization.

The power of customized reports.

I have to say, my favourite thing about PointClickCare are the reports. I can run any kind of report that I need right within the system. From a 24-hour report that gives me all the information I need if I’ve been out of the office for a couple of days, to an eMAR report that allows me to see how my team is doing with their med passes, to a Point of Care report that shows me where my care managers are with their day-to-day care for our residents. With PointClickCare, the entire team has access to the system and we have the ability to document everything we do including, documenting medication given to residents, changes in resident behaviour, or even family communication that has taken place.

To put it into perspective, if I have a resident that has a change in their health status and as a result they move to a different level of care, the entire team remains connected and up-to-date on this change. Every staff member within our community is using the same system to track resident care and we all have access to the same information, which is incredibly beneficial to the team compared to relying on paper documentation for information. We no longer have to worry about missing important details because as long as everyone is properly documenting and tracking their work, we all know what’s happening to any given resident, at any given time.

Accessing valuable information quickly and easily.

One thing about PointClickCare that I truly value is the availability of information. I now have the ability to sit at my desk and pull all the information I need at the click of a button, and I immediately have a full view of what is happening in all areas of the community.

Our teams are located in several different buildings, so before PointClickCare I would literally have to walk from building to building to see where someone was at with their med passes. I love that PointClickCare saves me time. Time that I’m able to use to support my team more, spend more time with our residents, and time that I can use to develop stronger relationships with our resident’s family members.

Working stronger and smarter as a team.

It’s no secret that we all have busy schedules and it’s often hard to document everything at all times. With PointClickCare, we can document much more easily and communication from the nurse, to the care manager, to the supervisor is easily shared. We are all aware at any given time what’s going on with all of our residents.

I wouldn’t say that we are doing things now that we necessarily couldn’t do before PointClickCare. It’s just that as a team, we work stronger and smarter together. We know more about our residents, more about what is happening across the community, and as a result we are able to effectively update staff, residents and family members, as we need to. PointClickCare equips us with the information we need, when we need it, giving us the ability to personalize the service and care we provide to every one of our residents.