A new app is bringing Kingston Health Sciences Centre into the 21st century.
The app is called PocketHealth, a program that puts all of a patient’s imaging results into one place, right on their phone.
The app makes transferring imaging results to patients smoother, and patients can take their results anywhere they go.
“We’ve been doing imaging for many, many years, obviously,” says Kelly Hubbard, manager of the imaging department at KHSC.
“This app has mined all of that data information back to 2011.”
Until this point, KHSC was burning CDs with imaging results and giving them to patients.
The PocketHealth app is helping make patients’ access to their results easier, as many new computers don’t have a disc drive in them.
“The same thing is happening at specialist’s offices, chiropractor’s offices, physiotherapist’s offices, and even family physician’s offices,” Hubbard says.
“They don’t have disc players. So taking a disc to them is not as accessible as it once was.”
Hubbard couldn’t put an exact dollar amount on how much money the app might save, but PocketHealth says Niagara-based hospitals that are using the app have already saved about $100,000.
But Hubbard says the app saves more than just money — it saves time too, as KHSC typically burned over 2,000 CDs each year.
“The time that’s taken to spend to burn those discs, we’re able to save that time and use it to get back to patients quicker on some of their appointments that we book for them,” she says.
“Which is a big stressor for patients these days.”
Hubbard says KHSC’s partnership with PocketHealth is a win-win situation for both patients and staff.
So now, when you get your imaging results done by KHSC, all your results will go to the cloud.