Issues with the data or patient records

Can I delete a patient from Vasc-Alert?

You are not able to delete patients from Vasc-Alert. The patient will automatically no longer appear in your reports when no treatment data has been received for greater than 30 days for that given patient. Likewise, if the patient returns to the facility after the 30 days, you do not need to re-enter them into Vasc-Alert. When treatment data is received for the patient, Vasc-Alert processes the data and begins producing Patient Detail Reports for the given patient, leaving the report when no treatment data was received.

How do I change the access for my patient in Vasc-Alert if I notice that it is not current or correct?

The access information in Vasc-Alert reports is reflected directly from your patient's treatment records and dialysis orders from your electronic medical record (EMR). If you notice that the access on your patient's Vasc-Alert report is inaccurate you will want to review the patient's specific dialysis order and treatment record. Once you have corrected the access in the EMR and the normal transfer of data to Vasc-Alert has occurred this will be reflected in the Vasc-Alert reports.

In order for Vasc-Alert to provide you with the most accurate data, it is important that you keep your EMR current. The calculations that are done to determine your patients VAPR and AAPR values use coefficients based off of what type of access and what size needle gauge your patient is using. If these values are incorrect in your EMR, they will be incorrect in your Vasc-Alert data which in turn will provide inaccurate results in your surveillance data to review.

How do I find reports for my patients who are not "on alert"?

There are a few of different ways to view the Patient Detail Report for patient who do not present "on alert".

One way to view Patient Detail Reports for your patients not on alert is in your weekly zip file. You can open and view these just as you would for your patients who are on alert. From this report, you can print selected pages or the whole report. As a reminder, many facilities will have more than one report for your patients not on alert in the weekly zip file. The zip files can only contain 30 patients, so if there are more than 30 patients additional zip files are created.
The second way to view reports for patients who are not on alert would be via the quick search option on the home page. You can search by the specific patient's name or medical record number.
A third option to view patients who are not on alert would be to go to the patient data tab at the top of your home page. All patients can be found on this page using the appropriate search terms and filtering. Again, you can also search by specific patient name or medical record number, but you must make sure the search terms match that of your patient.

How do I remove patients from my Vasc-Alert reports that are not in the center anymore?

You do not have to manually remove patients who expire, transfer, or no longer attend your center for dialysis treatments. Once 30 days have passed without Vasc-Alert recieving any treatment data for a patient, the patient will no longer show up in your center's reports. If for some reason the patient returns to your center they will begin to appear in your Vasc-Alert data once they are re-initiated in your EMR (electronic medical record).

Patient X and Patient Y are now on 15 gauge needles, but the system still shows them on 16 gauge. Can I edit the needle gauge for these patients?

The Vasc-Alert system uses information that comes from the patients' electronic medical record (EMR). It is important to update your patients' standing orders in your EMR any time there are changes to the vascular access or treatment orders. Vasc-Alert cannot change the information received from your EMR. Once you update the patients' orders in your EMR the results will be corrected from the date of the change going forward.

Should I always send my patients who have elevated VAPR or AAPR for a referral?

You should always consider all surveillance and monitoring tools when determining whether a patient needs a referral. Some patients will have a consistently high VAPR results. There are various reasons for this; documented high flow access, lower extremity access, stenosis identified but at a steady, non-progressing state. In these cases, the VAPR is elevated, but without an increase in trend indicating growing stenosis, so referral may not be indicated at this time unless other indicators are out of parameter.

Why do I see records for patients who are not at my clinic?

Patients will show up in the reports for a center for 30 days since they were last treated there. This can sometimes lead to confusion when transient patients shows up in the reports for a center that they do not normally attend, because they were treated there once or twice in the last 30 days.

Why don't VAPR and AAPR results show up for catheter patients?

Vasc-Alert calculates the VAPR and AAPR values for arteriovenous (AV) accesses only (fistulas and grafts). The averaged venous and arterial pressures (VP and AP) and blood flow are included in the Patient Detail report for patients using catheters.

Why is there no data for patient X?

If a patient was in attendance on a given day but there are no VAPR and AAPR results in the Patient Detail reports, most likely some of the dialysis treatment data was out of range. For example the mean arterial pressure (MAP) was lower than 60 or the blood flow rate (BFR) was not greater than 200. Also treatments must be more than an hour in length for results to be calculated, so treatments less than an hour in length would not have results for VAPR and AAPR.

If there is no information recorded for a given day, either the patient was not in attendance or their treatment data was not recorded in the EMR.