Plain Language Description: Ocean to OTN Integration

To further increase adoption and utilization of the Ontario Health (OH) eConsult Service, Ocean eReferral will be integrated with the OH eConsult Service to simplify and improve the provider experience for initiating a new eConsult.  To the greatest extent possible, this implementation will maintain uniformity/consistency with the process of initiating a eReferral, which eReferral users are already familiar with. OH eConsult is a secure web-based tool that allows primary care physicians and nurse practitioners timely access to specialist advice for patients and often eliminates the need for an in-person specialist visit. The eConsult Service comprises several different service models and generates over 5000 cases per month across 100+ specialties. More than 1800 primary care providers are active users of the eConsult service.

eCE Ocean eReferral integrates with commonly used Electronic Medical Records (EMR)s such as Telus PSS, QHR Accuro, and OSCAR to simplify the process of initiating referrals directly from a patient’s chart in the EMR, using the Ocean eReferral “toolbar”. These electronic referrals also significantly improve the quality of the information delivered to the receiver (clarity, completeness, appropriateness, etc.). Since going live in August of 2017, the number of eReferral processed has risen to over 14, 000 per month, with more than 1500 active providers, most of who use Telus PSS EMR, across the participating regions.

eCE Ocean and OH are each acting as a Health Information Network Provider (HINP) when providing the integration service to health care providers. Privacy and security assessments have been undertaken by the eHealth Centre of Excellence in collaboration with OH. For more information, email [email protected].   

Last Revised: August 2022