Preoperative counseling prior to a scheduled surgery is one of the most fundamental medical procedures. It is legally required, medically necessary, and at the same time one of the most time-consuming parts of the preoperative admission process. In many hospitals, this process still largely takes place the same way it did twenty years ago: handwritten forms, standard information conveyed verbally, and documentation completed after the consultation. <\/p>\n\n
The real question isn’t whether this process can be digitized. It’s more specific: Where exactly does the effort lie\u2014and what structural changes can be made there without compromising the quality of the investigation? <\/p>\n\n
A typical preoperative admission process is divided into three stages: preparing patients before their appointment, the medical history and informed consent phase at the facility, and documentation and handover to the hospital information system (HIS). In each of these phases, paper-based processes give rise to structural inefficiencies\u2014not due to individual errors, but because of systemic issues. <\/p>\n\n
Before their appointment<\/strong>, patients often do not receive their medical records until they arrive at the clinic. Medical history forms are filled out by hand and are often incomplete. Missing information regarding prior medical conditions, medications, or allergies must be gathered again during the consultation\u2014an extra step that would not be necessary if the documentation were complete in advance. <\/p>\n\n During the informational session<\/strong> itself, basic information about standard procedures is conveyed verbally on a daily basis, regardless of what a person has already understood and what they have not. The session begins at a standardized starting point rather than addressing areas where an individual still needs clarification. <\/p>\n\n After the consultation<\/strong>, additional work is required due to media discontinuity: handwritten or form-based consent documents are scanned and maintained alongside the digital patient record. The transfer to the HIS is done manually or not at all. <\/p>\n