User Guide

Relations with other VistA Components

The Consults package communicates with CPRS through HL7 messages. Order Checking receives information from the Consults package through CPRS. Notifications is the only major package that Consults communicates with directly. When the requesting clinician signs the order, Consults sends a notification to the consulting physician and when the consulting physician signs the final report, Consults sends a notification to the requesting physician.

Inter-Facility Consults (IFC) are requested, acted upon, and viewed the same way as regular Consults. Typically consults that are handled at a different facility have the remote facility indicated in their title, such as “Eye Exam—Salt Lake.” The software uses HL7 messaging in the background to communicate inter-facility consults and actions between cooperating facilities. Results are filed at the resulting facility, but since CPRS uses Remote Data Views in the background to access the results, users do not need to treat Inter-Facility Consults any differently.

Related Manuals and Other References

If you are an ADPAC or IRM personnel, the Consult/Request Tracking Technical Manual would probably aid in your understanding of Consults setup and operation.

Consults is installed with CPRS, so the CPRS Installation Guide is the appropriate manual to refer to on installation issues that aren’t covered in the Consult/Request Tracking Technical Manual.
TIU provides boilerplate text and other text-oriented services. The TIU Clinical Coordinator & User Manual would assist you in using these features.
Consults package is highly integrated with CPRS. As such, any Consults package user should be familiar with the CPRS Clinician’s Getting Started Guide and the CPRS Clinical Coordinator & User Manual.

See our web pages at:

vista.med.va.gov/consults

and

vista.med.va.gov/cprs

Package Management

Service Update and Tracking Security

Your ADPAC can use the Consult Service User Management option, in conjunction with availability to various menus and options, to control access to Consults functionality. The menus that can be provided to you are:

Consult Service Tracking

The Consult Service Tracking menu provides access to basic consult tracking functions and reports, but can also provide complete update capabilities if you have been granted update privileges by your ADPAC.

Individual options in the Consults package that may be useful to you, and what access they provide, are detailed in the following table:

Option	Services
Consult Service Tracking	Tracking and/or update functionality depending upon your individual privileges.
Completion Time Statistics	Reporting.
Service Consults Pending Resolution	Reporting.

With the GMRC Service User Management option, your ADPAC can set you up to be an update user for one or more services at your hospital. In addition, the ADPAC can grant the ability to receive consult notifications according to criteria outlined in the following table:

Category	Notifications Received
UPDATE USERS W/O NOTIFICATIONS	Unless otherwise set up, will not receive notifications.
UPDATE TEAMS W/O NOTIFICATIONS	Unless otherwise set up, will not receive notifications.
UPDATE USER CLASS W/O NOTIFS	Unless otherwise set up, will not receive notifications.
SERVICE INDIVIDUAL TO NOTIFY	Receive consult notifications for your service.
SERVICE TEAM TO NOTIFY	Receive consult notifications for patients assigned to your team.*
NOTIFICATION BY PT LOCATION INDIVIDUAL TO NOTIFY	Receive all consult notifications for your service for patients in a specified ward.
NOTIFICATION BY PT LOCATION TEAM TO NOTIFY	Receive consult notifications for patients assigned to your team and in a specified ward
SPECIAL UPDATES INDIVIDUAL	An individual who has privileges to perform group status updates.

These categories are not mutually exclusive, meaning you may receive notifications based on being present on one or more of the lists detailed in the foregoing table.

* NOTE: The service team does not receive the CONSULT/REQUEST UPDATED notification if another member of that team or an update user is the user adding the comment

Privilege	Granted
Originate a consult	Anyone with access to CPRS
Sign a consult	Anyone who can sign an order
Change a consult status	Anyone with update privileges
View or print a consult	Anyone with access to CPRS

In summary, update user capabilities vary depending on

The option(s) that you are assigned.

Privileges granted in the Consults Service User Management option.