WWL Embeds National Clinical Guidance Into Altera Digital Health’s Sunrise EPR to Transform Acute Abdomen Pathway

Key Takeaways

• 100% compliance with Acute Abdomen documentation standards
• Urgent CT reporting within one hour rose to 76%
• First Best Practice Tariff awarded for emergency laparotomy
• Automated NELA guidance integrated into Sunrise EPR workflow
• One‑click CT ordering reduces delays and improves risk stratification

Pulse Analysis

The acute abdomen pathway has long been a bottleneck in UK emergency departments, hampered by paper‑based processes and fragmented communication. By aligning the workflow with the National Emergency Laparotomy Audit, WWL addressed a critical gap: clinicians needed real‑time, evidence‑based prompts to ensure every patient received the right assessment at the right time. The Sunrise EPR’s configurability allowed the trust to embed NELA guidance directly at the point of care, turning a complex protocol into an intuitive, step‑by‑step digital checklist.

Implementation delivered rapid, quantifiable improvements. Documentation compliance hit 100%, and age‑complex medicine and critical care outreach reviews were completed for every high‑risk patient. Most striking was the jump in urgent CT scan turnaround—from 41% to 76% reported within an hour—thanks to one‑click ordering and radiology prioritisation built into the system. These operational gains unlocked the Best Practice Tariff, a performance‑linked funding stream that will support ongoing enhancements and signal to other NHS trusts the financial upside of digital compliance.

WWL’s experience underscores a broader shift toward configurable health‑IT platforms that can embed national guidelines without custom code. Altera’s Sunrise EPR demonstrates how a single, adaptable solution can be rolled out across specialties, fostering consistency, reducing variation, and improving patient safety. As more trusts pursue similar pathways—especially in high‑risk surgical domains—the market for integrated decision‑support tools is set to expand, offering vendors a clear growth avenue while delivering tangible clinical and economic benefits to the NHS.