Opportunity

Executives at The Christ Hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio, made a bold decision in 2007 to integrate multiple nurse call systems and automate emergency code broadcasting, which had been a manual process for the PBX operator of this 555-bed acute care facility. The hospital wanted a reliable and flexible situational awareness system that could be customized to meet its needs.

“SARA allows us to generate alerts with greater specificity and easily change them as needed. For example, we can include the general nature of an alert plus the room number as well as the department name, wing or floor. The more information we provide, the better our workflow, response times and overall patient care.”

Chad Scalf, Clinical Systems Analyst

Solution

Through SARA, clinicians and code teams at The Christ Hospital automatically receive alerts via their mobile phones, in-house phones and pagers. Emergency alerts are also broadcast on TV monitors. “From a patient safety standpoint, the faster you can notify the appropriate people, the faster they can respond to a code blue or other emergency,” explains Chad Scalf, clinical systems analyst supporting more than 200 software applications for the hospital. “And faster response means greater survival rates with lower costs to the business.” SARA’s Quick Messages capability enables the hospital to create alerts on demand for delivery to its closed-circuit TVs. Situations that may warrant such mass notification include an infant abduction, inclement weather or a security concern such as an agitated patient or visitor – any triggering event that could impact a hospital and its occupants.

Results

• Improved workflow, response times and overall patient care through alerts with specific details, not generic nomenclature
• Sends alerts directly to clinicians via their mobile devices
• Also broadcasts emergency alerts on CCTVs
• Creates on-demand mass notifications for delivery to CCTVs
• Integrated with fire panels
• Exploring other integrations such as temperature monitoring