RCHT Emergency Department Scan4Safety
As some of you may have heard there is a team in the hospital called Scan4Safety who are working on a plan to improve workflow and patient safety, starting in the Emergency Department. I attended a seminar with them this morning were they outlined the plan. The team are very positive and keen that ideas come from the clinical team who understand the problems and are likely to know how to solve them. The Central idea is to scan patient wristbands, inventory used during the patient journey and investigations such as blood samples so that all of these are tied together to reduce errors and improve data analysis. By tracking patients' movement through the department bottlenecks can be identified in real time and planning can be implemented to improve patient flow. Deep data analysis can identify recurrent hold ups, for example whilst waiting for a particular investigation to be performed or reported.
A secondary plan involves moving paperwork over to digital versions. Many fields will auto-populate (fill themselves in) and it is hoped that this information flow will start with the ambulance form being transmitted to the department before the patient even arrives. This can be used to auto-populate triage and RATs forms. Clearly, this will save a huge amount of time. Efficiencies will also be gained in reception where notes will no longer need to be scanned.
It has also been suggested that we use videos instead of patient education leaflets and a great system exists which we can easily use through the trust website. This will help patients' recover and potentially reduce reattendances, calls to the department, GP visits and Google misinformation.
Below is the presentation shown during the session. If you click on it you should be able to open it in the browser.
Funding is currently being applied for and the results will be known in a few weeks time. I am Scan4Safety medical lead and Tony Smith is nursing lead. Please contact us if you have any questions, suggestions or want to become part of the team.
Dr Toby Bateson
RCHT ED Speciality Doctor, ED Educational IT Lead, ED Scan4Safety Medical Lead