Patent ID: 7509280
Filing Date: 2009-03-24
Classification: G06Q,G16H

Abstract:
1. A method of accurately associating medical information with a given person in a healthcare enterprise, the enterprise having a plurality of healthcare facilities, comprising: networking a centralized server system with at least one computer at each of the plurality of healthcare facilities, the centralized server system operating a suite of health care software applications; generating a master index of enterprise patient names and their associated patient identifiers; storing the master index on the centralized server system; permitting access to the master index directly by practitioners at each of the plurality of healthcare facilities; establishing in the centralized server system a shared document repository; storing enterprise patient medical records in the shared document repository; permitting access to the shared document repository to practitioners at each of the plurality of healthcare facilities; receiving patient specific data regarding a certain person to be treated at one of the healthcare facilities; comparing the patient specific data to the stored patient identifiers; determining whether the comparing the patient specific data to the stored patient identifiers results in positively identifying the certain person; determining a set of two or more tentative patients whose patient identifiers most closely correlate to the patient specific data, if the comparing the patient specific data to the stored patient identifiers results in identifying multiple patients; displaying the set of tentative patients and their associated patient identifiers to facilitate a positive identification of the certain person; enabling the practitioner to attempt to positively identify the certain person from the displayed patient identifiers in the displayed set of tentative patients; receiving additional patient specific data regarding the certain person in response to an inability to positively identify the certain person from the displayed set of tentative patients; comparing the patient specific data and the additional patient specific data to the stored patient identifiers; determining whether the comparing the patient specific data and the additional patient specific data to the stored patient identifiers results in positively identifying the certain person; determining another set of two or more tentative patients whose patient identifiers most closely correlate to the patient specific data and the additional patient specific data, if the comparing the patient specific data and the additional patient specific data to the stored patient identifiers results in identifying multiple patients; displaying the another set of tentative patients and their associated patient identifiers to facilitate a positive identification of the certain person; enabling the practitioner to attempt to positively identify the certain person from the displayed patient identifiers in the displayed another set of tentative patients; permitting access, in response to the certain person being positively identified, directly to the shared document repository on the centralized server system storing the medical record for the certain person being positively identified; and adding the certain person to the master index as a new patient, in response to the certain person not being positively identified.