(Q3/23)ESO Updates: Quarterly Product Enhancements

In listening to feedback from our users and customers, we’ve recognized that many of you want to stay in the loop on ESO product improvements. Our intent is to provide updates quarterly, so that you don’t have to wait for Wave 2024 featuring ESO Training Academy and regional user groups to know what’s on our product roadmap.  

Here are a few highlights from Q3, what we’re looking forward to in Q4, and some insight into how we think about product management at ESO.  

Content applicability by Product 

QM Alerting 

The new QM Alerting feature will keep you in the loop on key types of patients, as well as any high-impact, low-frequency scenarios that your crews encounter. This feature will send an email notifying selected recipients any time an EHR record that meets that alert definition is locked, so that you can follow up as needed. 

EHR Critical Care Enhancements  

We are excited to roll out some items specific to our critical care agencies. This release included new flowchart items (e.g., High Flow Nasal Canula) along with a new field to document patient height to help with pediatric medication dosing documentation and calculating body mass index (BMI). We are just getting started, so keep an eye out for more critical care-related flowchart items and forms in the upcoming weeks. 

EHR M2M Enhancements 

We have enhanced our Mobile2Mobile feature to include assessments, last known well, and symptom onset. When these key data points are documented by the BLS or First Response team, they’ll now transfer over to the transporting unit’s chart for the hospital to view, eliminating the need for double documentation. 

EHR Custom Validation Rules 

The Custom Rule Builder is a new tool that will allow ESO to rapidly respond and deploy new closed-call rules to help your agency meet your unique documentation requirements. If you’re interested in participating in a beta program or holding a conversation to see if this is something your agency needs, please reach out to your ESO account manager.  

Patient Registry 

The ESO Patient Registry Beta is a new modern, secure, cloud-based platform that manages all aspects of data collection, verification, monitoring, and compliance of a service line. It will help hospitals quickly and easily turn clinical data into information and knowledge when they need it. The launch of this innovative product lays the foundation for a seamless integration of data across prehospital, in-hospital, and post-acute care environments – allowing for more time spent on improving patient outcomes and less on data entry. 

Inventory Controlled Substances Module  

The new Controlled Substances module in Inventory provides agencies with the ability to track controlled substances from the point of entry into their system to use in patient care or disposal, helping them stay DEA compliant. Along with standardizing workflows as controlled substances move through an agency, and verifying crew and witnesses at every step, the Controlled Substance module’s “oversight queue” gives administrators a central place to review any concerning activity such as missing, damaged, or expired items, data entry errors, and more. It also allows for the ability to add notes throughout an investigation until the point of closure. 

Snowflake Reader Account 

For customers who want to run dashboards and visualize their data, ESO Insights offers quick access to an easy-to-use BI tool for low-technical analysis. But what if they have bigger plans for their data or have their own data warehouse infrastructure and reporting tools? For these data power users, a Snowflake Reader Account offers direct access to their ESO data for integration into their own data environment, such as Data Warehouses, BI Tool, Data Science Tools, etc. 

Fire Incident Investigations 

Documenting a separate, secure investigation apart from the core fire incident is vital for fire investigators. With ESO Fire Incident Investigations, the user can now save valuable time while improving security, by adding key fields and revamping file uploads for bulk attachments with drag and drop. 

Fire Properties OVAP Scoring 

Occupancy Vulnerability Assessment Profile (OVAP) is a tool that allows departments to categorize risks present in their community and generate an OVAP score for all properties, buildings, and occupancies with the intent to address Community Risk Reduction. Fire departments can rely on OVAP scoring to help identify target hazards in their communities, supplement pre-incident plans, perform community risk assessments, and use risk assessment data when applying for grants or accreditation. 

Single-Sign On 

Federated Single-Sign-On allows users to authenticate themselves across multiple systems and applications using a single set of login credentials with their chosen identity provider. This increases security, simplifies the organization’s administration, and results in a better user experience. If you’re interested in participating in a beta program, please reach out to your ESO account representative.  

What to expect in Q4/23? 

We have a few more exciting enhancements in the works we plan to wrap up before the year is over. Please stay tuned for release notes and the next product blog, but here’s a sneak preview of a few updates and enhancements we have planned: 

EMS 

• For EHR, we have continued investments and updates geared towards our Critical Care customers, along with in-app warnings for State Schematron issues so that you maintain high data quality for your State data submissions 
• For QM, there are major upcoming enhancements including the ability to auto-assign cases, see outcomes, and report in Insights 

Fire 

• For Incidents, we’re adding the ability to implement Apparatus Seating Position, a common feature request 
• Administrators right to require decontamination fields be completed on certain incident types  
• For Insights, look for updates in Reporting for Activities, and Permits & Hydrants  
• For Inspections, Looks for changes in the Reinspection Lifecycle

Hospital 

• For Insights, expect additional dashboards for Patient Registry and HDE for both EMS agencies and hospitals.

Cross-Product / ESO Suite 

• We’re adding Multi-Factor Authentication using SAML 2.0 and Product Training in Resource Center 

To learn more about ESO Product Management or any of the updates above, register to join us for Wave 2024 featuring ESO Training Academy or be on the lookout for more updates directly in the ESO application.   

About Product Management at ESO 

The ESO Product Management team is responsible for the ESO Product Roadmap, including the products, features, and functionality we build out next. We collaborate daily with support, sales, customer success, industry experts and executives, and most importantly with our customers and users to find out how we can best advance ESO’s mission of improving community health and safety through the power of data.  

We practice what we preach by looking at the world through a data lens, paying close attention to everything from support tickets, enhancement requests, feedback from demos, RFPs, notes from conversations at trade shows, observations from ride-alongs and customer visits to much more. We then take these learnings and use them to influence the product roadmap.  

Last quarter, we implemented another avenue to collect meaningful data – in-app surveys that asked our users how likely they are to recommend ESO’s products. Thank you so much for the thousands of helpful responses we received. We read and discussed every single one of them – the good, the bad, and the funny. We will be asking for feedback periodically going forward so we can measure whether we’re on the right track as a trusted partner to you and your mission. We’re also trying out a new way of submitting feature enhancement requests directly from within ESO Suite to make it even easier for you to share your ideas – stay tuned for more information!