Royal Inland Hospital uses an ACE computer system that is mostly paperless.

(SHANNON AINSLIE / iNFOnews.ca)

While short-staffing and a pandemic is enough to drag down the quality of healthcare at Royal Inland Hospital, some nurses there say a new computer system is making it far worse.

The ACE System was installed in the beginning of summer this year, moving orders for nurses from old fashioned pieces of paper onto computer screens.

One nurse, whose identity is being protected due to possible job repercussions, claims the new system is slowing nurses down, resulting in less care for patients.

“When orders were on paper it was very clear to nurses what their instructions were,” she said. “With the computer system, doctors and surgeons are having problems and are putting orders in different places. It isn’t user-friendly and there isn’t any continuity. The nurses then have to figure out where the orders are and commonly have to phone the surgeon for clarification.”

Glenda Powers has a husband in the hospital recovering from an operation.

“What I have seen is nurses spending half their shifts on the computers,” Powers said. “This really takes away from the quality of care for the patients. Many times it took a couple of them together to figure out something in the program. It is very frustrating for both the patients and the nurses.”

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The nurse said some healthcare staff are second guessing every order while others are not second guessing enough.

“I see some of us having to phone and check and clarify, which is very time consuming and takes away from the care we are giving,” she said. “Some nurses don’t check what is on the screen thoroughly enough and sometimes things get missed.”

She said the doctors, surgeons and patients are all frustrated, and things have not been smoothed out for months since the system was implemented.

“We do bring our concerns forward but nothing has changed,” she said. “We all know how to do our jobs well, this is maddening. I don’t understand why, after months of staffing shortages, COVID and burn out we were given a new, complicated system to try to deal with.”

A nurse from a different sector at the hospital was also granted anonymity to ensure her job safety.

“ACE was initiated at the hospital and rolled out over a one-month time span,” she said. “We were not prepared for this program at all.”

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She said healthcare staff received six hours of training on the new system.

“We were in the middle of the pandemic and in a critical staffing shortage,” she said. “It was punching another hole in an already sinking ship. With ACE on a daily basis, critical patient orders are getting missed, medications aren’t being transcribed or given appropriately, blood transfusions are getting delayed or missed, and communication with interdisciplinary team members is severely severed.”

She said the system is redundant, repetitive, and a time eater in an already time sensitive environment.

The system is part of the Advancing Care Electronically Project that began in 2020, putting Royal Inland Hospital as the first of the larger hospitals within Interior Health to move to an almost paperless electronic system for all documentation, ordering and communication.

“The transition away from paper records towards electronic records is critical as the health care system in British Columbia continues to modernize,” Interior Health said in an email to iNFOnews. “Electronic documentation through our ACE (Accessing Care Electronically) system allows patient records to be more easily accessed by all members of the care team, creating a seamless record of care and strengthening patient safety."

The organization said timeliness and accuracy of ordered diagnostics, interventions and medications are enhanced through computerized order entry.

“Nurses have always documented the care they provide to their patients; with ACE they now complete this work electronically rather than on paper,” it said. “With the implementation of ACE, nurses use workstations-on-wheels to complete their digital charting.”

The organization said that overall, ACE strengthens the quality of patient records by improving access to online records across the continuum of care.

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