Situation
Bringing together hospitals, long-term care as well as primary care and community service providers in Ontario’s Southwest, the SWRWCP provides evidence-based wound care information, shaped by best practice. It does this through an educational framework and the promotion of an inter-disciplinary team approach. The SWRWCP needed to translate this mission into practical, web-based tools.
Task
Support the SWRWCP’s mission by creating a web resource for patients, caregivers and providers, embedding an interactive e-learning tool to promote best practices in wound care and the treatment of diabetic foot ulcers and by building a tool that enables interdisciplinary provider collaboration.
Action
Thehealthline began by understanding wound care pathways and translating complex care algorithms into a logic flow for recommended treatment options. This was used to underpin an online training tool featuring detailed images and treatment descriptions. A resource-rich website was built around the tool to provide context and background. For diabetic foot ulcers, the site leveraged the health services database to enable providers to correlate a patient’s risk level with the recommended members of a care team.
Results
Launched in 2017, the website has seen wide acceptance in the Southwest provider community with more than 700 registered users. It is one of the few online, interactive resources available addressing the needs of both public and providers. The site is evidence-based and frequently updated to new best practices, making it a valuable and scalable resource.