MyABDR Update

SUZANNE O'CALLAGHAN, PETER O'HALLORAN AND LACHLAN MENG 
Suzanne O'Callaghan is Policy Research and Education Manager, Haemophilia Foundation Australia

Peter O’Halloran is Executive Director and Chief Information Officer and Lachlan Meng is a Support Officer at the National Blood Authority

It hardly seems like any time since MyABDR was released – the end of February 2014, to be exact! – and yet there have already been two new releases with more features and enhancements, and another is due for release in early November.

YOU ASKED FOR IT!

Enhancements for new releases are developed from feedback by:

• The MyABDR focus group (6-9 volunteers – a sample of people with bleeding disorders or parents from around Australia)
• Community members at MyABDR information sessions
• Haemophilia Centre staff
• MyABDR users survey responses
• Feedback provided direct by users to the MyABDR Support helpdesk.

So if you gave some feedback or made suggestions in the July 2014 MyABDR User Survey, said what you thought at a community session, phoned or emailed MyABDR Support with a problem or suggestion, your comments have been used to improve MyABDR.

‘Bugs’ (where something is not working as it should) are fixed straight away by the developers at the National Blood Authority (NBA).

Other proposed improvements are checked at several levels and prioritised for new releases. In August 2014, for example, one of the tasks for the MyABDR focus group was to give their preference on some possible improvements for recording treatment and getting reports from MyABDR. This will then go to the Haemophilia Centre representatives at the ABDR User Reference Group to make sure it works for them too.

WHAT'S NEW?

The second and third releases in May and July 2014 included new features and fixes, for example:

• Upload photos when you record treatment or write a memo, along with the option to ‘hide’ this photo from the treatment centre (i.e. make it a personal note)
• The ability to upload a range of documents (such as PDFs, Word, Excel and images) through the MyABDR website.

Two further releases of MyABDR are scheduled over the coming six months to bring you further improvements and features. The next release (scheduled for early November) includes enhancements such as:

• Changes in the way that the synchronisation works, which will more than cut in half the amount of time the synchronisation takes and ensure that data is always captured in the central database, even if an error occurs on your smartphone
• A short-cut to your treatment plan from the home page of the screen – making it quicker and easier than ever before to get to this key information
• Changes in the way the ‘copy forward’ function works when recording treatments or entering received product to reduce the number of inadvertent double-entries experienced by some users.

HAVE YOU UPDATED WITH THE NEW RELEASE?

Make sure you update your smartphone with the latest version of the app to install the new features and fixes.

Finding out about new releases:

• You will receive an email alerting you to the new release
• Your smart phone will alert you when an update becomes available.

Then

• Go to the App Store (iPhone) or Google Play (Android)
• Search for MyABDR
• Check for UPDATES
• INSTALL the new release.

For a cleaner installation, you may prefer to uninstall the existing MyABDR app on your smartphone and replace it by installing the new version. Make sure you go online to sync your data at the home page before you uninstall the app!

If you use the web site, you don’t need to do anything – you will just see the new features the next time you login.