Stephen Herczeg inquest: Coroner Mark Johns blasts SA Health’s EPAS over death
THE State Coroner has slammed SA Health’s controversial new electronic patient records system for “effectively preventing the court from establishing the truth” in the death of a former Socceroo.
- Former Socceroo died after ‘series of hospital blunders’
- Coroner: SA Health’s EPAS record ‘confusing’, could damage inquests
- Inquest hears Stephen Herczeg died amid lack of communication
- Police considered Herczeg ‘may have caused own death’, inquest hears
THE State Coroner has slammed SA Health’s controversial new electronic patient records system for “effectively preventing the court from establishing the truth” in the death of a former Socceroo.
Coroner Mark Johns is investigating the death of Stephen Herczeg, 72, at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital on September 19 last year.
SA Health E Health Systems chief director William LeBlanc fronted the inquest on Wednesday and was unable to explain one of the documents assessing Mr Herczeg’s condition that had been generated by EPAS.
That prompted Mr Johns to question how SA Health had submitted “considerably worse than satisfactory” evidence.
“How on earth is it that printing a hard copy is not included as a basic function of EPAS?” he said.
“Was the system trying to avoid the scrutiny by courts?”
Mr Johns said he had raised the issue of the functionality of EPAS with Health Minister Jack Snelling for more than a year.
“It’s effectively preventing the court from establishing the truth of a patient’s death in the SA public health system,” he said.
“It is entirely attributable to EPAS. How on earth are we in this situation?”
Mr LeBlanc said it was possible for hospital staff to enter patient information on another staff’s log-in account in EPAS.
Mr Johns said the electronic system raised “ambiguity” in who actually made the patient observation and who entered the information into EPAS.
“In my years observing negligence cases, as they (medical staff) had written it down (in paper based system), they accepted they had made that entry ... because they had seen their signature and their handwriting ... and they can remember that in the witness box,” he said.
Student nurse Melissa Warren-Smith on Tuesday had disputed the fact she had entered Mr Herczeg’s information using nurse Waitmatai Fiorentino’s account into EPAS.
Addressing issues of EPAS “freezing” or “locking out” users attempting to log in, Mr LeBlanc said those had been identified as problems with software and the computer itself.