A nurse logs in on Monday morning and finds that a familiar screen looks different. A button has moved, a field has a new label, or a step she has done a thousand times now takes an extra click. Nothing is broken, but the floor is irritated, the helpdesk phone is ringing and the director of nursing is asking why no one warned them.
Most of that friction is avoidable. Electronic health record vendors publish information about upcoming changes. What many organizations lack is a routine for reading it, deciding what matters and preparing staff. Here is a simple one.
Release notes are written for a broad audience, often in technical language and in large volume. Nobody has time to read them, so they pile up in an inbox. Without an owner, the first notice of a change is the change itself.
The solution is not to read every word. It is to assign a person, set a rhythm and filter for what affects your workflows.
Choose someone, such as a clinical informatics lead, your EHR administrator or a designated super user, who is responsible for reviewing vendor communications. Name a backup so vacations do not break the routine. Make sure the vendor's notices go to a shared mailbox or group, not one person's inbox.
Check what your vendor provides, which may include:
Release notes or update announcements
Customer portal bulletins
Webinars or training sessions
Notices from your account representative
User community forums and groups
Confirm how and when your organization is notified about updates, and whether any changes are optional or can be scheduled. Do not assume; ask your vendor.
Put a recurring slot on the calendar, such as a short weekly or biweekly review, plus extra time when a major update is announced. During the review, the owner skims for items that touch:
Documentation screens nurses and aides use every shift
Assessments and care plans, especially those tied to regulatory requirements
Billing and reporting that business office staff rely on
Security and sign-in changes, such as new authentication steps
Integrations with pharmacy, lab and other systems your IT team supports
For each relevant item, write a short plain-language summary answering:
What is changing, and when?
Who is affected?
What will staff see or do differently?
Is any action needed first, such as a configuration decision or a test?
Who needs to be told?
Keep summaries to a few sentences. If the change is optional, decide with clinical leadership whether to adopt it now, later or never.
If your vendor offers a test or training environment, have your super users walk through key workflows before the change reaches everyone. Pay particular attention to workflows tied to regulatory documentation. Note any issues and report them to the vendor.
Match the effort to the size of the change:
Minor: a short note in the shift huddle, or a one-page tip sheet.
Moderate: a brief huddle demo and a quick reference guide, with super users available during the first shifts.
Major: scheduled training, with sign-off that staff completed it and a plan for nights and weekends.
Brief the helpdesk and super users in advance so they can answer questions, and post downtime or change notices where staff will see them.
After the change, gather feedback. What confused people? What questions came up repeatedly? Record the answers and adjust your training approach. Keep a simple log of changes, dates and communications, which also helps when you need to trace when a workflow shifted.
Updates sometimes change how users sign in or what permissions roles have. Have IT review notes for security-related changes, and confirm that access settings still match your role design after significant updates.
A fifteen-minute review that happens every week is worth more than an ambitious process nobody follows. UnityCare IT helps care organizations set up this kind of change-readiness routine alongside their super user networks and helpdesk.
Keeping PointClickCare and other EHR systems fast, connected and available.
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Existing customers: support@unitycareit.com
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