EAPOC stands for the Evidence at the Point-of-Care System. It is an app/web portal made for patients aged 16+ with asthma or COPD. You start by completing a short questionnaire about your symptoms and medications (by yourself or with your healthcare provider), and this information is then analyzed and presented to your provider. Based on the latest Canadian medical guidelines, your provider receives recommendations on how to improve your care. Sometimes, these recommendations will include new prescriptions for asthma or COPD medications. The system also creates what’s called an “action plan” – a personalized guide for what to do if your asthma or COPD flares up (see “What is an action plan?”).
Ultimately, our goals are to:
Improve the communication between patients and healthcare providers
and
Assist healthcare providers in providing the most up-to-date and best care for their patients with asthma and COPD
For all of these EAPOC functions to work, your provider must also have access to the system.
Our team has built EAPOC in such a way that it can be directly linked into the electronic medical record systems used by most primary care providers across Canada, and it can be used in any pharmacy. Many healthcare providers are already using it. If your healthcare provider is not using it, please direct them to our website, where they can learn more about it and contact our team to be onboarded!
We have built and developed the EAPOC over the last 15+ years, with over 20 scientific publications supporting the various parts of the tool. In our clinical trial, the tool was used in 3 busy family practice clinics in Ontario, there was a significant improvement in the quality of care received by patients.
It's quick! It typically takes only 5-7 minutes to complete the questionnaire the first time.
After completing the questionnaire for the first time, you may choose to complete it again at a later date if your condition changes, and/or you may be asked to complete it by your provider. Prior responses will be saved, and you will simply have to confirm whether or not anything has changed.
An action plan is a set of personal instructions for managing your asthma or COPD. Depending on the symptoms you are experiencing, you may fall into 1 of 3 categories in your action plan:
Your action plan will tell you what to look out for in each zone and what you should do when you are in each zone. Most importantly, when your asthma or COPD is flaring and you are in the yellow zone, it will tell you how to adjust your medications to get back in control. Once your healthcare provider has approved it, you can ask them to print out your action plan and/or you can access it through the EAPOC portal.
This is an example of an asthma action plan:
This is an example of a COPD action plan:
EAPOC was made for patients with asthma or COPD who are 16 years of age or older.
To provide the best care, EAPOC uses research that was performed in patients 16 years old and over. Unfortunately, some of these recommendations may not apply to patients under 16 years old. If you or your child with asthma are younger than 16 years old, we strongly recommend that you see your healthcare provider to follow-up on your asthma.
To use the EAPOC app or web portal you will need a device that can access the Internet. You will also need a personal email account to complete your registration. That’s it!
We designed EAPOC so that people can easily use it even if they don’t have a lot of experience with the Internet and technology.
We recommend that you use an updated version of Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Microsoft Edge as your browser to access the EAPOC portal. If you are using EAPOC’s asthma tool through your clinic, you can also access it through the EAPOC app, on your smartphone or tablet (the app can be downloaded for free from the Google Play Store or Apple Store).
No - EAPOC is FREE for patients! Our goal is to improve health without introducing any financial barriers for patients.
Your healthcare provider will use the information you provide to improve your care! By filling in the questionnaire, you will provide information about your symptoms, triggers, and medications. This information will only be sent to your healthcare provider (if they have access to EAPOC), who can verify your disease control, recommend updates to your medications, and create an action plan for you.
Yes, your personal health information is private and secure, and is handled in accordance with provincial personal health information protection laws. For a more detailed description of our privacy practices, please see our Privacy Notice.
If you are having trouble registering for EAPOC, please follow our step-by-step guide for clinic patient users or for pharmacy patient users.
You may be entering your login information incorrectly, or may have made an error the first time you logged in. If you can’t identify the error, please use our Contact Us form to submit an inquiry, and we will gladly help you access your account.
You can contact us for any questions or feedback through the Contact Us form.