Improving quality of care and patient outcomes are the core objectives of a new database being set up for renal patients at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, thanks to your support.
The Central and Northern Adelaide Renal and Transplantation Service (CNARTS) Clinical Database Project has received $200,000 from Kidney, Transplant & Diabetes Research Australia (KTDRA) to help improve patient journeys.
CNARTS is one of the largest kidney care and transplant units in Australia and based at the RAH.
Thanks to the grant, CNARTS can now access data to measure and audit the service delivery, patient care and outcomes.
Two project officers, Samantha Welke and Dr Richard Le Leu, have worked with clinicians to design and develop the specialised database, which has captured all CNARTS services and clinical outcomes across the patient journey.
This includes patients in end stage kidney disease, patients on dialysis and transplant patients.
Nephrologist Associate Professor Shilpa Jesudason, who is leading the data management project, said the data management system will benefit clinicians and patients.
“Without good data on the patient journey, we struggle to improve the care we provide,” A/Prof Jesudason said.
“This database will help us understand how we care for patients, the quality of care they get and their outcomes – we can then be sure that our care is world class.”
CNARTS clinicians will be able to audit and report on service delivery and health outcomes, and to set evidence-based world-class benchmarks for improving patient care.
The Database will also collect critical service feedback directly from patients, with the ability to send out and collect surveys from the database, which are automatically uploaded and reported back to clinicians.
A/Prof Jesudason said the Database ‘future-proofs’ CNARTS data management by improving efficiencies and capabilities in data management for CNARTS clinicians.
The Database will also provide flexibility to expand data collection along with service developments and evolving treatments.
