Kyunghee University Hospital in Gangdong (KUHG), southeastern Seoul, said it has digitalized all the informing procedures for patients to promote convenience.

For the first time in Korea, the hospital has launched a mobile application where patients can check information such as the outpatient clinic, hospitalization, and surgery on their smartphones, it said.

Smart Guide

KUHG unveiled its Smart Guide, a mobile app that provides integrated information, ranging from the outpatient clinic, hospitalization and surgery, at a news conference on Wednesday.

Patients can not only check the schedules of consultation, examination, waiting time for seeing the physician and progress in surgery but receive the meeting time with the physician in advance. They can also open a medical bill and easily request medical documents such as a written diagnosis.

The hospital said it also plans to establish a mobile payment system to enable patients to pay their medical bills on a smartphone.

Hospitalized patients will no longer have to write down their food intakes, excretion, and exercises but merely type them on Smart Guide, which will reduce the chance of information loss and enhance convenience, KUHG said. The mobile app will also make it easier for patients to receive documents such as a written diagnosis, confirmation of hospitalization and a breakdown of medical fees, without revisiting the hospital.

KUHG said its employees developed the app on their own. The development staffs, having more than 10 years of career in medical information business at the hospital, were able to apply the best system for KUHG, it said.

“The best thing about Smart Guide is it provides service for hospitalized patients,” said Lee Seung-yeob, head of the Medical Information Team at KUHG. “During the hospitalization, they can check themselves information about doses of drug they have taken, the doctor’s round schedule and examination schedule on the app.”

Lee took an example of a patient requesting an injection of pain reliever. Formerly, the patient had to ask physicians if he or she can receive it, he said. Through Smart Guide, however, the patient can see the names and side effects of the drug he or she is receiving, Lee explained.

Thanks to the mobile app, guardians of patients will not have to wait for long hours in front of operation rooms because they can check a detailed progress in operation, according to Lee.

“In the past, guardians who had to go to work on the patient’s operation day found it difficult to focus on work. Even when they stayed in front of the operation room, they had to wait for the operation to finish for hours doing nothing,” Lee said. “Smart Guide updates data about an operation progress from the operation standby, during the operation and the completion of the surgery, in every 5 minutes.”

Kim Ki-tack, president of KUHG, also said, “The introduction of Smart Guide means that the hospital will take care of numerous hospital procedures that used to weigh on patients and guardians.”

The mobile app will reduce the wasted time for patients and guardians, contributing to lowering the overall social cost,” he added.

minju9minju@docdocdoc.co.kr

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