Ardens has created a variety of resources to assist with identifying patients who may have chronic kidney disease, and to support the patient's ongoing management once diagnosed.
Recording Information on the Management of CKD Patients
The Ardens Chronic Kidney Disease – CKD clinical template has been designed to standardise consultations, ensuring clinicians are following the latest national guidelines and recording accurate coding of data.
To locate the Ardens CKD Template, access the relevant patient record. Open a new consultation and select the Run Template option (if not in a open consultation, click on the Add button on the EMIS ribbon, followed by Data Using Template option).
This will open the Template Picker screen. If you have accessed any templates before, these will display to the left of the screen. Search for the template by typing “CKD” in the search box.
This will return the Chronic Kidney Disease - CKD (Ardens) template (alternatively select the Ardens > Clinical Templates > Renal folder to the right of the screen).
All the Ardens Templates follow the latest NICE guidance and best practice information. This template includes:
- National Contracts (QOF/IIF) page for capturing QOF/IIF requirements.
- Initial diagnosis – HX/Exam page to risk factors and examination data including smoking status.
- Initial diagnosis – Tests page to record and view relevant blood and urine tests.
- Initial diagnosis – Management page to record diagnosis and document advice and management.
- Review of Known CKD page to complete a structured review.
- Referrals page to record suspected cancer referral and other referrals.
- Vaccinations page to record and view latest influenza, pneumococcal and COVID vaccinations.
- Review Completion and Recall page providing the ability to document an annual or interim review has been completed (necessary if using the Ardens LTC Recall System) and to record a diary date for future DOAC review or annual AF review – this will link to the Ardens Diary Recall System.
- Resources & Patient Messaging page providing helpful links to information for patients and professionals and information on QOF indicators.
- Template Info/Learning Points page providing template information and instructions for use, NICE copyright information and links to appraisal toolkits to enable recording of learning.
Within the National Contracts page, if the indicator has NOT been achieved for this financial year, there will be a red cross and red writing will denote action needed.
However, if the indicator has been achieved there will be a green tick and the writing will no longer be red.
Please note - the above only applies to the National Contracts page, all other contract information on additional pages will be displayed in red and/or denoted by an asterix (*).
For patients presenting with multiple long term conditions, you may wish to use the Ardens Multi-Morbidity templates.
Ardens Clinical Safety Alerts
The Ardens resources includes Clinical Safety Alerts to flag in real-time important MHRA drug safety and NICE guidance information that maybe missed. The alerts are triggered automatically by certain activity entered in the patient record e.g. entering a particular code or prescribing specific drugs. Further information on the Clinical Safety Alerts included can be found here.
A clinical safety warning will display, if your CKD patient is on an ACE inhibitor and you are recording a gastro-like illness.
If issuing metformin to patients with a low eGFR the following clinical safety alert will display:
Ardens CKD Data Quality Alerts
The Ardens resources includes Data Quality Alerts to alert practice staff in real time of incorrect coding or missing QOF requirements. These will ensure that you are entering accurate data to include your CKD patients on the QOF CKD register.
The Possible CKD alert will display in the pink QOF alert box for you to consider CKD if a patients latest eGFR is less than 60.
Ardens CKD Searches
Ardens has provided various searches which may be useful to support practices with the care of CKD patients:
- Diary Recall System - allows practice staff to easily manage diary recalls for blood tests, injections, procedures, and follow-ups.
- Conditions - CKD – include searches to support practices with the management of CKD.
- Ardens Case Finders - contains a suite of searches to support practices to improve data quality and ensure QOF payments are correctly calculated for your CKD patients.
If you require any further assistance on the process above, please contact Ardens support on: