Multi-Specialty Scheduling System Using Acuity Scores
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current healthcare systems face inefficiencies in scheduling follow-up visits and laboratory investigations across multiple specialties, leading to duplicative tests, increased costs, and delayed healthcare delivery, particularly for patients with complex conditions like cardiovascular disease, due to disjointed electronic medical records and lack of coordinated care.
Innovation Solution
A multi-specialty integrated care clinic system that uses a computer program and mobile device application to generate a Specialty Acuity Score and Total Risk Score, facilitating standardized scheduling and coordination of care across multiple specialties, allowing for same-day visits and minimizing duplication of tests and visits.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If traditional individualized physician scheduling systems are used, then each physician can manage their own appointments independently, but coordination between multiple specialties becomes nearly impossible leading to duplicated lab investigations and increased healthcare costs
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges individual physician scheduling systems into a unified multi-specialty scheduling platform that consolidates appointment booking, patient records, and lab investigation coordination across all specialists and primary care providers into a single integrated system, eliminating the need for separate scheduling systems while maintaining individual physician control
Solution Approach 2:
The scheduling system is designed with universal functionality to handle diverse scheduling needs across multiple specialties, primary care, and laboratory services through a single platform that adapts to different physician preferences and patient requirements while coordinating care across the entire healthcare team
2Adaptability or versatility
If follow-up visits and lab investigations are scheduled in a non-standardized manner, then physicians have flexibility in scheduling, but this leads to duplicative tests and delayed healthcare delivery
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements dynamic scheduling that adapts to changing clinical needs, physician availability, and patient conditions in real-time, allowing schedules to be automatically adjusted and optimized while maintaining flexibility for urgent changes or special circumstances
Solution Approach 2:
The scheduling system utilizes parameter-based decision-making where scheduling intervals, priorities, and coordination timing are determined by clinical parameters such as patient condition severity, test results, and physician workload, enabling standardized yet adaptable scheduling that reduces duplication while preserving necessary flexibility
3Reliability
If separate EMR systems are used by different specialists, then each physician can maintain their own patient records, but coordination of same-day visits and multi-specialty care becomes impossible
Solution Approach 1:
The system merges separate EMR systems into a unified electronic medical record platform that consolidates patient data, clinical notes, lab results, and imaging reports from all specialists and primary care providers into a single shared repository, ensuring all providers access the same accurate information while maintaining individual record integrity
Solution Approach 2:
The integrated EMR system acts as an intermediary that facilitates seamless information exchange between different specialists and primary care providers, automatically sharing relevant patient data, test results, and care plans across the healthcare team while maintaining data security and provider-specific access controls
Data Source
AI summary
A method of automated medical scheduling including the steps of receiving data on a processor via a checklist, said data being a plurality of predetermined physical conditions of a patient, each of the plurality of predetermined physical conditions having a predetermined assigned weight based on level of severity, generating a summation of the total weight for each predetermined physical condition, generating a predetermined specialty acuity score by comparing the corresponding range of the total weight and generating a report to output of the specialty acuity score, the specialty acuity score used to determine priority of scheduling patients in a system. A specialty acuity score may be generated for each system affected, the systems each assigned a value of 1. A comorbidity score may be generated by the summation of each system. A TOR score may generated by multiplying the summation of each system by the total specialty acuity scores.