Cardiac clinic rises from the ashes

When fire ripped through Dr. Ron Lehman's Ashford Cardiac Clinic in Adelaide early one Sunday morning, years of medical research and thousands of patients' records appeared doomed.

The building and vital medical and IT equipment were destroyed, leaving one of South Australia's busiest cardiac treatment centres facing disaster.

It also caused extreme anxiety among many of the chronically ill patients who feared having their treatment interrupted.

Incredibly though, not one of the patients who was booked in that week failed to see their specialist. Despite the destruction of the clinic, it was back in operation just two days later.

The remarkable turnaround was partly due to finding empty office space nearby and the cooperation of the clinic's suppliers in providing equipment.

But the critical component in the successful recovery was the clinic's strict adherence to daily data back-up procedures and a close relationship with its IT provider Shaw Solutions: "Within 24 hours we had access to all our records and were able to contact patients booked in the day after the fire," said Ashford Cardiac Clinic's practice manager Margaret Clamp. "By Tuesday afternoon we were back in operation and seeing patients."

Ashford Cardiac Clinic switched from a mainly paper-based practice to a fully computerised operation last year.

Shaw Solutions installed a fully integrated management system using its Promadis Medical and Promadis Imaging software. This powerful program collates and processes all data, including clinical records, pathology, prescriptions, appointments and billing. Paper documents, such as medical information, referrals and correspondence, are automatically scanned into the system and attached to the patient's file.

The clinic's research unit, South Australian Cardiac Research, also has its files managed by the same program. To help speed the recovery, Shaw Solutions lent the clinic one of its servers so the data could be loaded immediately from the back-up tape: "Every scrap of information is stored on the main server, which is fully backed up every day," said Shaw Solutions sales and marketing manager Peter Fulton. "It meant the process of getting the clinic back in business was fairly straightforward, even though it was a frantic couple of days.

"Once we had identified and addressed their immediate needs, we were able to progressively bring the practice back into full operation.

"Successful disaster recovery is a by-product of careful preparation, and Ashford Cardiac Clinic had most of the necessary systems in place. It's all about minimising risk wherever possible."

Margaret Clamp said the speed of the recovery had prevented long-term damage to the practice: "We were vulnerable because it is essential to maintain the confidence of our patients in our ability to continue unbroken, quality treatment," she said.

"Thanks to the rapid response of Shaw Solutions and the integrity of its software and back-up systems, our patients suffered minimal inconvenience."