The Glaucoma Flow Sheet

BY JOHN H. TANTON, M.D. A reproduction of the Glaucoma Flow Sheet

SUMMARY SHEETS HELP CONDENSE DATA

Just keeping track of the voluminous data in a chronic disease like glaucoma can become a problem. After following a patient for ten years or so, one may accumulate several hundred bits of information, including pressures, disk drawings, visions, medications of varying strengths and dosage schedules, etc.

Let's face it-in a busy practice it can sometimes be difficult figuring out what's going on. If you have quite a few glaucoma patients, memory may fail when you try to recall the exact circumstances of the patient you're facing. "Let's see, is this the lady who...?" A chart shuffle ensues in an effort to orient oneself.

To help remedy this problem, I began to develop a glaucoma summary sheet nearly 20 years ago. I tried to pick the best features from other doctors', and I have progressively modified the resulting design based on my experience as well as that of my four partners. The sheet has worked so well for us that we thought others might like to give it a try.

Advantages

While the advantages of this type of summary sheet are numerous, several characteristics can be quickly highlighted. The accompanying illustration demonstrates that the glaucoma sheet can:

allow the collection of large volumes of data in a compact area:

help bring a particular patient's full situation quickly back to mind;

provide an examination check list so that items are not overlooked, and serves to jog the memory so that those same items can be repeated in a timely fashion;

constitute a graphic record to be shown to patients to help explain their progress;

serve as a travel record or be incorporated into a referral letter that can be given to a patient;

keep the glaucoma risk factors and the side effects of medications in the forefront of your minds: and

adapt easily to a computerized format.

Intrigued? Give it a try! Here's how to get started.

First, try the sheet on some freshly diagnosed patients so that you can capture the complete record from the first day on a single sheet.

If you like the sheet, old patients can be transferred to it in midstream-or an aide can go back and enter all of the old datato give a complete record. Note that your nurse does most of the data entry. This takes very little of the doctor's time-it's a real time-saver.

If you would like to give the sheet a try, a camera-ready copy (with a blank masthead to receive your logo) and a full instruction booklet are available for $50 from the Glaucoma Sheet Project, Burns Clinic Foundation, 560 West Mitchell Street, Petoskey, MI 49770; (616) 348-2379.

Checks should be made payable to the Burns Clinic Foundation. Proceeds are used to further this project by sending a complimentary copy of the booklet and camera-ready copy to all residents and glaucoma fellows as they finish their training to promote the concept of using such a sheet, if not this particular one. Any new versions of the sheet that are developed will be provided to you at no additional charge. We will also be glad to consult over the phone with your office personnel on installing the sheet in your practice.

Author information: John H. Tanton, M.D., is in private practice at the Burns Clinic, 560 W. Mitchell St., Petoskey, MI 49770. Dr. Tanton has no financial interest in the glaucoma sheet.