Secure communication: working to improve access to secure email, HRM and e-referral.

As many of you know, access to ONE-MAIL ended on September 28. Some of you signed up for Teramach to enable secure email with specialist colleagues. One of your Mid-West FP Network Executive, Dr. Hedi Erenrich, has been meeting with Teramach to improve the onboarding process, and with hospital partners to improve recognition of receipt of emails using this platform. Here is a testimonial from one of our family physicians:

“My transition from onemail to Teramach was seamless. I now can send encrypted emails to patients and people outside of the hospital directories too.” Dr. Bill Etzkorn

If you are experiencing ongoing challenges with secure email, please let us know.

Hospital Report Manager: HRM
Another Executive member, Dr. Fred Freedman, has been meeting with Ontario MD to improve the delivery of hospital reports. As you have likely experienced, the process has been burdened with multiple faxes and repeated EMR reports. Until we are able to sort this out, Fred has secured the following helpful link in case you are having difficulties with HRM:

“Stop Paper Process” 
Clicking on this link will take you to a list of all the facilities across the province who send reports via HRM. It lists their name and location, and you can download the number of types of reports each facility sends. Next to each facility on the left-hand side of the page appears a green circle with a while plus sign. Clicking on the circle will reveal contact information and specifics about how to stop unnecessary faxes.

E-Referral: The OCEAN Platform
The Ministry of Health has funded the licensing of eReferral for all primary care providers in Ontario. It’s seen as a “game changer” by colleagues who use e-Referral. Not only is the referral form in your respective EMR, but it allows the specialist receiving the referral to get back to both you and your patients and book the appointments directly. There is a team in the Mid-West to help onboard your office to the OCEAN platform – please contact Kelly Anderson if interested.  Kelly.anderson@uhn.ca)here are community specialists available on the platform, and, over time, we will have the majority of hospital specialists accessible. Those of you signed up with SCOPE will increasingly have direct access to selected SCOPE services such as the Headache program. Please also see below for access to Child and Youth Mental Health programming.

General Internal Medicine at the Toronto Western Hospital has been added to eConsult

The expertise of UHN’s general internists through eConsult is available to ask eneral medical questions, diagnostic dilemmas, assistance with diagnostic workups, lab test interpretation, hypertension workup and management, and advice on management of patients with complex comorbidities. You can find the TWH GIM E-consult Team in the eConsult Platform under: Internal Medicine or by typing in “general internal medicine”. Responses usually are provided within 48 hours.