Welcome to Instinct – lets do this!
Here is your handy guide, including what you can expect, for your Instinct EMR Go-Live.
Know that our expert team will be there every step of the way. We’ve done this in some of the largest veterinary centers in the world. Instinct EMR is built for this!
Preparing for Go-Live
Team Communication Ahead of Go-Live
A well-informed team is the first step towards a successful change.
We recommend sending out announcements to your hospital regularly leading up to go-live and posting signs throughout the workplace about the upcoming change.
💡 ProTip: Print and fill out this “Instinct is Coming” flyer to post in the hospital to generate excitement and easily access more information about Instinct and our training guides!
Meet Careville and Designating Superusers
Get to Know Careville: Careville is Instinct’s official training home base containing short videos, training guides, and new feature lists. All superusers and staff should be familiar with this before go-live. We highly recommend sharing this site to all your staff well in advance so they can review all the training material before go-live.
Pick a Go-Live Captain: The Go-Live Captain will be the main superuser on your team that leads the transition to Instinct EMR. The Captain will ensure that the staff has reviewed the training materials and scheduled the recommended training (see Go-Live Day below).
Pick a Medical Lead: Your medical lead can be a medical director, lead veterinarian, or assigned veterinarian and may be the same person as the Go-Live Captain. This leader will assist/review Chart documents and Treatment Sheets while supervising the transition by following our Medical and Workflow Guidelines.
Pick Other Superusers: Additional superusers will assist the Medical Lead and Captain during go-live. These users should be scheduled to work during go-live and ideally cover all shifts.
Designate Users with Admin Access: Designate those that will have admin access in Instinct. These users will be trusted to configure settings and the Instinct Support Team will schedule a separate training specific for admin users (see below).
Training Meetings Ahead of Go-Live
Admin User Training: This training will be geared for your administrators and will include the details about how to configure Instinct settings and admin features.
Superuser Training: The Instinct Support Team will schedule a separate training for all the superusers and Medical Lead ahead of go-live. This training usually takes 2 hours (can be split up into two sessions if preferred) and is conducted via video/screen share.
Front Desk Training: Front desk training will be done separately from the superuser and admin training and should include most of your front desk staff. This training is relatively shorter (usually about 45-60 minutes) and will be done ahead of go-live. You may want to consider delegating a front desk lead that will help facilitate and monitor the scheduling of appointments and check in / check out processes for the days of go-live.
Require Staff to Read Careville Articles: We have extremely informative and easy to consume articles on Careville. We strongly recommend all staff are required to read these ahead of go-live. Administrators can also create a checklist of all staff members and mark down who has reviewed the training materials.
Installation and Logging In
Instinct should be installed on all of your workstations well ahead of go-live and you will receive detailed instructions for this. If you work with a separate IT company, please coordinate with them to have the installation completed and tested at least two weeks before go-live.
After that, the customer support team will let you know when your database is live and you can log in. We recommend testing it once we let you know!
Set Up TV Monitors to Display Status Boards
TV mode in Instinct allows you to view your Status Boards on large screen TVs hung vertically in a main treatment or reception area. The TV allows for better communication throughout the hospital regarding the volume of patients and their care, and we recommend having one TV for Inpatients and one TV for Outpatients. A specific TV mode login is used for viewing only (0000 or 000000 depending on your PIN setup) and does not log out after 5 minutes of inactivity. Once displayed, your Status Board can be filtered depending on where the monitor is located in the hospital.
💡Protip: Learn how to set up your TV monitor in our handy Careville article, How do I put Instinct on a TV screen?
Label Printers
Please refer to our DYMO Label Printer Guide and make sure you’ve tested your label printers ahead of go live to ensure these are working properly.
Distributing Login Information
All staff members should know their unique login information before go-live. Logins are confidential and should not be displayed for all staff to see. You should decide on a plan to distribute these beforehand.
Staff Scheduling for Go-Live
While not necessary, some hospitals consider scheduling procedures and/or appointments lightly during the first day of go-live.
If training demos are scheduled during the days of go-live, you may want to consider having staff come in if they are scheduled ‘off’ to view the training. Of course, this is also optional especially if staff view the training materials before go-live.
Finally, be sure to schedule the superusers accordingly on go-live days. If your hospital has several departments, you may want to schedule a superuser for each department to assist during the transition.
Day Before Go-Live
Prepare Your Status Boards
The Go-Live Captain should work with your Front Desk Leads to review the Appointment Calendar and check-in/check out process.
If any test patients are checked in to Instinct, you can move them to the Boarding Board so they are out of the way. Please remember we always recommend using the specific ‘Instinct Test’ patients when testing as these patients are not included in any analytic reports.
TV Mode
Make sure your TV monitors are hung up vertically and are displaying Instinct!
Go-Live
At most hospitals, the team is on site for the first 2 days with the goal being to train and support your staff during the transition to Instinct EMR.
During the first day, our team arrives in the morning, takes a break for lunch and dinner, and returns for a few hours after dinner to accommodate night staff. We will repeat this for day 2.
As a friendly reminder, the entire Instinct team is available via live chat throughout the go-live and after we depart 24/7/365.
Support During the Go-Live
Front Desk: Instinct provides specific training with your front desk staff (usually at the front desk). We usually recommend starting training here early on day 1 to get Instinct set up for the medical team. This training takes between 30-60 minutes.
On the Floor: Instinct provides one-on-one training with your staff on the floor in real time. During this, we spend time with medical teams working on their patients and are available to move throughout the hospital as needed.
Admin: We can provide additional admin trainings for all users that will have administrator access in Instinct.
Training Sessions (Optional): Some hospitals elect to have us perform live scheduled training sessions for their team. Training sessions last around 2 hours including Q&A. We recommend aiming for a maximum of 2 sessions per day as we’ve found that larger groups work best so staff can benefit from each other’s questions.
The overview below is indicative of a typical go-live schedule. We are here to support a training program that fits your hospital best, so please let us know what works best for your hospital!
DAY 1:
- 9am: Instinct team arrives.
- 9am – 10am: Instinct team meets administrators and key people and get a tour of the hospital, so we know our way around the hospital.
- 10am – 12pm: Instinct team available to staff for questions and guidance.
- 12pm – 1pm: Instinct team to break for lunch.
- 1pm – 4pm: Instinct team available to staff for questions and guidance.
- 4pm – 7pm(ish): Instinct team to break for dinner.
- 7pm – 9pm(ish): Instinct team available to staff for questions and guidance.
The goal of day 1 is to get all existing patients transitioned to Instinct! Hospitalized patients should have their treatment sheets transferred to Instinct so no patient is using an Instinct treatment sheet and paper/other digital treatment sheet at the same time. Any new patients should also be checked in via Instinct on day 1.
DAY 2:
- 9am: Instinct team arrives.
- 9am – 12pm: Instinct team available to staff for questions and guidance.
- 12pm – 1pm: Instinct team to break for lunch.
- 1pm – 4pm: Instinct team available to staff for questions and guidance.
- 4pm – 7pm(ish): Instinct team to break for dinner.
- 7pm – 9pm(ish): Instinct team available to staff for questions and guidance.
Patient Safety on Go-Live Day
Patient safety is the top priority during any digital transition. Here are some important tips to keep in mind during the initial transition.
Important Safety Tips:
- Timing: It is ideal to have all patients transitioned onto EMR before shift changes begin later in the day. That said, transitioning existing patients to EMR must be handled carefully and the goal is to transfer patients at a comfortable pace for staff.
Medical Leadership: The Instinct team asks that we have guidance or assistance from a medical superuser on how best to start transitioning the patients over to EMR.
Inputting Orders: The Instinct team does not input treatments for patients. This must be done by your medical team for patient care and safety reasons. It’s also a great opportunity for practice!
Duplication Errors: No patient should ever have a live EMR treatment sheet and an old sheet at the same time for safety reasons. Once the switch is made, the team must commit patient by patient. We recommend crossing out hours on the old sheet or removing it from the treatment area completely.
- Workflow: Large hospitals may want to consider transferring patients onto EMR per department. Example, all the ICU cases first, then surgery, then internal medicine and so forth.
After Go-Live
Daily/Weekly Communication Updates: Many hospitals communicate tips, key learnings, and general workflow information daily or weekly starting on day one of go-live as the team adjusts to Instinct. One way to do this is to try to create a summary of the top 5 main points to cover in each update email.
Recap Meetings
Our customer support team can schedule a recap meeting (usually a day or two after go-live, but at your convenience) with your key leaders if necessary. This would allow us to troubleshoot any issues, discuss feedback on the process, and answer questions as they come up! We’re also available to help with any additional training that is needed.
Instinct Workflow Committee: Many hospitals create a workflow committee to include your Captain, Medical Lead, superuser, and designated admins to improve workflow after go-live. The Instinct committee can meet weekly/bi-monthly to review workflow processes and any other questions/issues that arise to help streamline the first few months after go-live.
And finally, we’re not going anywhere! Our team will be there for you for months (and years) as Instinct gets better and better with new features and advancements. You can always reach our team via chat or at support@instinct.vet which goes to our entire team at once.
Let’s do this! 🚀 Welcome to the Instinct Family! 🧡