Patient Consult Summary application - for Victoria Health organisations
Create and share a consult summary for your patient during a Video Call
Please note: this application is currently in a testing phase.
The Patient Consult Summary app allows health practitioners to create and share a patient consultation summary with a patient before the end of a Video Call consultation.
Access is limited to Victorian public health services until July 2025. Between now and July 2025, use of the application will be monitored to ensure quality and safety. During this period the application functionality may be updated or suspended in response to user feedback.
This app was developed by Monash University’s Faculty of Information Technology researchers, in collaboration with Monash Health, Healthdirect Australia, the University of Melbourne, with funding from Digital Health CRC Ltd and Victoria Department of Health. It has been co-designed and evaluated with clinicians, patients, and carers using an agile research and development approach.
The following forms are designed for organisations and clinics interested in using this application:
- To request access to the Patient Consult Summary app for your clinic(s), please use this consent form.
- For health practitioners using the app, please provide your feedback using this survey.
Watch the how-to video
Here is a link to the above how-to video.
This demonstration video shows the Patient Consult Summary app being used during a Video Call consultation.
How it works
Using the Patient Consult Summary App
| Click on the Patient Consult Summary app button in the Video call screen to launch the app. |  |
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The app opens and the health practitioner can create the format of the summary by adding a Title and setting up the Section headings. These headings can be selected from predefined options or you can create a new section and reorder the sections as required for your patient's needs, using the up and down arrows. If you uncheck a section to deselect it, it will not appear in the summary you create. Click Next once you have set up the format of the summary. |
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| In the summary screen, the health practitioner can now start creating the summary by entering the necessary information for the consultation at the top, including their role, the patient's name and date of birth. |  |
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During the consultation, the health practitioner can type the relevant information being discussed into the summary fields. Please note, this is not shared with the patient at this stage. There is a mic button at the top of the app, if enabled in the clinic configuration, which allows dictation into the app. As with other voice to text applications, dictation is not always accurate as it may misidentify words or pick up external sounds, so the health practitioner needs to check to ensure that the final summary sent to the patient is correct. |
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Both participants see the same non-editable preview screen, however the health service provider has extra function buttons at the bottom. On the preview screen, health practitioners and patients will see highlighted terms. Hovering their mouse over the highlighted terms will display medical terminology explanations. These explanations are sourced from Healthdirect’s glossary of medical terms and help patients understand the summary more easily.
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Health practitioners can also add their own explanations to specific terms by clicking Add New Explanation. Type in the word(s) and add the explanation. The summary will update and any newly added explanations will display - but will not persist beyond the current call. When the summary is emailed or downloaded the highlighted medical explanations will appear at the bottom of the summary. |
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Once the summary has been discussed , health practitioners can send it to the patient or to themselves via email. Click the Email button and add the required email address. A copy of the summary will also be sent automatically to the configured clinic email account for record-keeping purposes. Both health practitioners and patients also have the option to print or save the summary as a PDF file. Remember that when the consultation ends, the summary will no longer be available in the Video Call platform.
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Configuration (for clinic administrators)
Please Note: as with all Healthdirect apps, this app does not store any data shared during the session. It does not for example, save the summary shared by the health service provider with their patient once the call ends. A copy is emailed to the configured email address for the health service and it is the responsibility of the clinic to keep these records.
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The default name for the app is Patient Consult Summary and this can be renamed by the clinic administrator, if desired. Enable App by clicking in the check box - it is not be enabled by default. Only Enable Dictation if the health service providers will be using this feature - as mentioned dictation may not necessarily be accurate so this will usually be left disabled. Add the Clinic Name. Add the clinic Email Address that will receive the finalised summaries - this will happen automatically once the summary is emailed to someone using the Email option. Add the Clinic Phone Number which will appear in the footer of the summary. Add the Clinic Address which will appear in the footer of the summary. Click Save Configuration if you make any changes. |
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