I am going to watch a movie on ASTRO Fox Movies Premium after this, and cannot help but post this off as I have finished it already.

Pals, I need to stop blogging here pretty soon, as I got other blogs to maintain as well, amongst which – one in particular, so posts here will be delayed or less frequent, unless I am fully energised and wish to rush a post here.

So here goes!

In the JCI Accreditation Standards for Hospitals – Introductory Post dated May 23, 2012 I had posted about the Management of Communication and Information (MCI) function and its direct and indirect relationship to the management of medical records.

In this post I shall talk about the first standard under this MCI function, namely “Communication with the Community, MCI.1” which states “The organization communicates with its community to facilitate access to care and access to information”.*

As part of a hospital, the Malaysian Medical Records Department (MRD) communicates directly to individuals but it is not normally authorised to communicate through public media and through agencies within the community or third parties.

There are 21 standards for this function, including 4 sub-standards and one sub=sub-standard for standard MCI.19, and 2 sub-standards for standard MCI.20.

Each standard has specific requirements. The Measurable Elements (MEs) are these specific requirements for each standard. The MEs simply list what is required to be in full compliance with the standard. The MEs will be reviewed and assigned a score during the accreditation survey process.

For MCI.1, the MEs measure the compliance of the MRD of the hospital to the requirements of this standard.  The MEs measure if:

• the MRD has identified its communities and populations of interest.
  • I think these defined key groups will include all forms of patient contact with the hospital such as emergency care patients, outpatients discharged patients, and non-patient groups like the next of kin, members of the general public, students, the Polis, and sometimes even members of the Press and Media.
• there is a communication strategy plan incorporating an on-going communication plan with its defined key groups of their communities and patient populations
• there is information provided to the public and to referral sources on MRD services, hours of operation, and the process to obtain care
• the MRD provides information on the quality of services to the public and to referral sources

If the MRD fully meets these requirements (full compliance), then I think the MRD as part of the organisation, has succeeded in communicating with its community to facilitate access to care and access to information.

Please note that this standard also applies to other departments of the hospital that also communicate with the community to facilitate access to care and access to information, for example the Public Relations Department.