Search

Feedback Form

Getting the most out of the new features in Synergy 1.8 and 1.9

by John Thompson, Applications Trainer, iSOFT

Working in conjunction with the IDC, iSOFT have developed and introduced the following new features in Synergy 1.8 and 1.9.

Print Record ( v1.9)

Based on a feature from Premiere, this enhancement allows the quick reporting and printing (in Word) of a selection of items chosen from within the open patient record.

Having first selected a patient and opened their record, on the Menu go to File/Print Record... then within the Print Record screen select the required tick boxes.

While you can tick the boxes every time you want to print items from a patient record, one of the best features of Print Record is that you can create and save Print Record templates for repeated use (see the box at the bottom left of the Print Record screen). Saved formats are practice-wide and are stored in S:\Meddata\printrecord as txt files. However, note that you can not Save the selected Problems headers themselves as these will differ from record to record

As the Print Record output goes into your native word processor you can record a macro or create autotext within your word processor to populate a standard paragraph of information into your Print Record formats at the touch of a key or two. If recording a macro start with <Return> twice and <Up arrow> twice to place the opening paragraph at the top of the document; use <Ctrl>+<End> to add a signature block irrespective of length of the individual document.

Graphical Sophie Editor (v1.8)

Within SOPHIE and Graphical Sophie Editor there are two new types of question: Library and Update Reminder.

A Library question allows you to link guidelines. For instance, instead of having a long and complex SOPHIE for CHD, Diabetes and Hypertension residing within your CHD SOPHIE you can add links to both the Hypertension and Diabetes SOPHIES. For example, you might want to add in a choice of several further guidelines to run from within an existing one, so from within the Graphical SOPHIE Editor add an MC5 question, giving as a prompt = “Do you want to use a further guideline”, with the choices

1 Diabetic Guideline
2 Hypertension Guideline
3 Asthma Guideline
4 ….. No choice given
5 Continue with current guideline

Connect the ends from these points

1 to LIB For Diabetic Guideline

2 to LIB For Hypertension Guideline

3 to LIB For Asthma Guideline

4 Connect to start or next question in host guideline

5 Connect to start or next question in host guideline

? Connect to start or next question in host guideline

How about writing a standard general health SOPHIE that covers most QOF registers and then joining this to all other guidelines that only have condition-specific questions? This way you have one set of questions that are required/good practice for all patients on an annual review but you can then pick, say, the ‘asthma’ choice to get the extra items for an asthma patient. This means that if you need to change, say, the way alcohol consumption is recorded in these linked programs you change it just once — in the alcohol guideline — knowing that this will be referred to by all other relevant SOPHIEs.

2. Update Reminder will answer in one go all reminders of the type you state. So you no longer have to prompt the user to remove reminders for last year (and perhaps previous years as well).

It is possible to create a SOPHIE that only contains ‘Update reminder’ entries.

GPP Workflow enhancements v1.9

Assign to Filter

Go to GPP Utilities and select the Assign to Filter Tab. Tick only those users who will have results assigned to them, leaving off all other practice employees.

This populates the default list of names which will be displayed using Reassign a result when next you use GPP links to view results. If when using GPP links you wish to see all other users tick the Full List box in Reassign a result window.

Result Location

Go to GPP Configuration and select Result Location tab. The code range 4.... to 4...z is not on the selection/search list. However If you would like to add ‘Laboratory Procedures’ (4....) as the default place where results are to be posted, select Do Not search, type in ‘Laboratory procedures (4....)’ and select Save. This will make this Problem your default result location.

Streamlined posting method

When viewing a result from the daybook ensure the Hide/View Actions Comments button is selected. In the two panes that are revealed you can right-click to add any of your preset Actions or Comments and also add free text actions/comments. This is an additional feature: you can still use previous methods to add Comments/Actions.

There are also now Post+Next and Post+Previous icons (However these may not show if too low a screen resolution is selected)

The patient’s usual and registered GP are now displayed when viewing results from the Daybook.

Print CD Date v1.9

Turns on or off the printing of the date on controlled drug prescriptions. Find it in Configuration Editor, on the Options menu.

Summarisation v1.9

For users who add multiple backdated entries into synergy you can tick the Summarisation box in configuration editor /Staff details for individual users.

This keeps the date in the ‘Applies from’ field within a patient note (as it used to do) so when adding historic data you might add a date of 01/09/2003 and click on Save; the next entry appears with that date rather than reverting to today’s date.

Formularies v1.9

To add a user to a formulary you can use either Configuration Editor/Staff Details or Edit Formulary from within Formulary editor.

If a user is allocated to a formulary then when selecting drugs you must select Cancel and tick Full Drug List to get access to the full formulary.

Items within the formulary are indicated by a red heart next to the drug and pack when selecting from formulary and full drug list.

If you can only see one or two drugs in your practice formulary after upgrading to 1.9 then a workaround is to go to Formulary Editor and Export your formulary. Now Rename your formulary (e.g. Practice* to Practice* OLD); create a new formulary called (Practice*) then import your old formulary. This creates a new formulary in v1.9 containing all your old drugs. If, after testing, the new formulary works then you can delete the one called *OLD that may not have been working. However, if the new formulary doesn’t work then Delete it and rename your old one back to what it was.

Notes: free text field v1.8

When editing free text within notes < CTRL> + <ENTER> now forces a line return rather than closing/saving the dialog box.

Appointments v2.1.9

Within Appointments you can now Dormant appointment Templates. This removes the clutter of having permanently to retain all templates for audit purposes after they have been used.

To achieve this, in Appointment Planner view, highlight an old template and tick the Dormant tick box. Untick this box to bring a template back into use.

Prescribing v1.8

The additional role type of ‘Nurse Independent Prescriber’ has been added to the Edit Nurse Prescriber list. Find it within Configuration Editor under Staff Details.

When a GP wishes to print a repeat medication that was added by a Nurse, from the Issue Medication (F6) screen change the selection in the Print column (Last column on Right) from ‘Nurse’ to ‘GP’ or vice versa.

Repeat Dispensing medication is now indicated by a red two bottle Icon.

Review date when extending can now be set to 0 months. Go to Configuration editor/ Practice details/ Extension Defaults and change Review date to 0 Months. Note — this is a practice-wide setting.

Print Configuration Settings v1.8

It is now possible to print the configuration settings from the Configuration Editor. To do this select the ‘Print Configuration’ option from the File menu in Configuration Editor. Simply tick the items you wish to print.

Full Instructions

Full details of all of the enhancements within Synergy are in the release notes for each version (Print from Upgrade CD) and Synergy Help files (F1)

Coming soon to a Surgery near you — Synergy v2! (Due mid-March 2009)

Synergy v2 will contain:

• Automatic Velocity coding of drugs

• The Gold view which displays both current and dormant headings, together with full drag and drop and multi-select functionality. These functions have repeatedly been asked for by the user group and iSOFT is delighted to be able to supply it.

• A major upgrade to PDS (the PDS Foundation module) which is a pre-requisite for ETP v2. This enables:

• Automatic synchronisation

• A lot more background processing

• NHS Number allocation

• Bulk PDS synchronisation

• Merge patient

• Better workflow

• Revised registration screens