Mission Hospital in southern California comprises two acute-care facilities with a total of 523 beds. The hospital also houses CHOC Children’s at Mission Health, a 48-bed dedicated pediatric hospital.
Following a review of its clinical information capabilities, Mission Hospital developed ‘The One’ concept—a vision for a comprehensive digital clinical information and communications platform, delivering patient-centric information in near-real time to clinicians.
IS Strategic Partner, Director – Southern California, Providence St. Joseph Health
Like many hospitals, Mission Hospital was operating with multiple legacy ICT systems—leading to siloed data and interoperability issues. As a result, nurses were carrying up to five different devices (pagers, secure messengers, phones, cameras, etc.). Caregivers were being constantly interrupted.
Nurses were walking a minimum of four miles a day collecting information and locating communication devices. General ward-wide alerts were disturbing patients, and increasing the risk for alarm fatigue among staff. In fact, communication issues were the number one reason behind delays in delivering patient care.
Mission Hospital selected Ascom to help realize the former’s ‘The One’ vision for an integrated clinical information and communications system. Using components from the Ascom Healthcare Platform, Ascom devised a solution comprising consulting services, Ascom Unite software, 350 Ascom Myco smartphones, and ongoing support.
The solution provides Mission Hospital with integrated nurse call and alerts and alarm notification management, as well as dynamic task assignment. Clinicians communicate, collaborate and coordinate via their Ascom Myco smartphones. They can, for instance, access clinical information such as live waveforms in near-real time on their smartphones.
Mission Hospital reports a range of key improvements with the new integrated solution. Clinicians now receive context-rich alerts directly on their Ascom Myco smartphones, letting them gauge the severity of an alert before interrupting a task and walking to the patient. Also, the Ascom Myco smartphone removes the need for nurses to carry multiple communication devices (and reclaims the time staff previously spent locating them).
Information flows, too, are more streamlined, with fewer gaps between siloes of clinical data. For example, clinicians use the Ascom Myco smartphone to photograph wounds and, thanks to third-party integration, upload the high-quality images directly to the hospital’s EMR without leaving the patient. Mission Hospital and Ascom are currently collaborating to expand ‘The One’ concept. There are, for example, plans to introduce data collection from infusion and IV pumps, to integrate barcode scanning with the EMR, and to implement Real Time Location Services (RTLS).