eHand-offs: An IBM Lotus Domino application for ensuring patient safety and enhancing resident supervision in hand-off communications.

Reliable communication of patient information among physicians during shift changes is an important patient safety parameter. The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations [JCAHO] recognized the pitfalls in hand off communications by including standardized hand-offs as a National Patient Safety Goals. We are presenting an electronic application called eHand-offs to address this problem in our residency program. Residents can use this application to hand-off patient information during admissions, transfers, and discharges. eHand-offs also functions as a surveillance tool for administrators to track patient hand offs, ensuring added patient safety and enhancing resident supervision and training.