New Electronic Tool Helping To Reduce The Risk Of Blood Clots

19 February 2018

An electronic tool designed to assess a patient’s risk of developing blood clots (also known as Venous Thromboembolism, or VTE) was 'launched' at Prince of Wales Hospital on Monday 19 February 2018.

A collaboration between eHealth NSW and the Clinical Excellence Commission (CEC), the VTE risk assessment package has been designed to support clinicians in identifying, measuring and documenting the VTE risk for adult patients in the inpatient setting.

Prince of Wales Hospital is the first hospital in NSW to introduce the electronic 'VTE Risk Assessment' following the completed trial at Blacktown Hospital in 2017.

Hospitalisation is strongly associated with the development of VTEs, the majority of which are preventable. Effective prevention is achieved through assessment of risk factors and the provision of appropriate prophylaxis.

All patients over 18 years of age admitted to a NSW public hospital must be assessed and managed for risk of VTE within 24 hours of admission. [NSW Health Policy PD2014_032: Prevention of Venous Thromboembolism].

The South Eastern Sydney Local Health District (SESLHD) Implementation eMR2 Project Team, SESLHD Clinical Surgical Stream Nurse Managers and the CEC VTE leads were on site for the launch.

"We are very excited to work with SESLHD, eHealth and the CEC to launch the electronic VTE Risk Assessment Tool here at POWH. We know that VTE is a leading cause of death associated with hospitalization," said Sarah Lyons, Project Manager for eMR2 SESLHD Implementation.

"Introducing an electronic VTE Risk assessment tool is an important step toward preventing VTE in hospitalised patients".