Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust (RCHT) is now able to manage clinical teams and medical tasks more efficiently and effectively throughout the night, leading to improved patient safety, following the deployment of a Hospital at Night system.
Deployed as part of RCHT's Service Improvement Programme (SIP), the system has transformed the trust's night shift handover process by allowing doctors to create an electronic work list of clinical tasks for patients who require extra attention and/or intervention during the night.
The move from a manual, paper-based system to a more automated, electronic process, means that senior nurses can analyse the levels and types of tasks being carried out, and allocate the correct mix of clinical experience and skills on each night shift, meeting the changing needs of the organisation.
Catherine Cade, service improvement lead at RCHT said: "By using IMS MAXIMS' Hospital at Night system, not only can we assess the types of clinical tasks that are being requested, but we can also see where the demand is coming from within the individual wards. Further to this, the system allows us to see whether tasks are being carried out within a timeframe. A report can be generated which allows us to see whether these targets are being met, and if not, we can change to improve this."
The system allows hospital staff to add, update and remove patients from the Hospital at Night work list through a simple data entry screen meaning they can finish their daytime shift with the reassurance that the night team have all the information and instructions they require to complete a safe, efficient night shift.
Subsequently, clinicians are able to easily record clinical information such as SBAR (Situation, Background, Assessment, Recommendation), clinical tasks, clinical responses and notes on the patient throughout the night, enabling doctors to have all the information they require for the following day on the ward.
Cade continued: "Part of our aim for SIP was to ensure that if, for example, a second clinician is needed for a medical issue to be dealt with at night, we are able to investigate this and work to get the right person, be it healthcare assistants, nurses or doctors, to the patient the first time round as efficiently as possible, rather than the wrong person quickly.
"Having looked at staffing rotas at night, we wanted to provide a safe, effective and competent multi-professional team with the right sort of skill mix and staff numbers to meet the immediate needs of patients. The IMS MAXIMS software has given us that information which has informed the decisions regarding staffing."
Key to the deployment was IMS MAXIMS' approach in involving healthcare professionals at every stage of the development process, ensuring their needs and those of patients were given the highest priority.
Cade added: "Clinicians have adopted the system extremely well, which can be attributed to a number of factors. The technology is very simple and easy-to-use, which was vital for time-sensitive users; a result of involving junior doctors in the development process. It also helped that doctors were already using IMS MAXIMS for other systems at the trust such as order communications and eDischarge, meaning that they were familiar with the technology.
"It was important to us that the IMS MAXIMS team understood how the NHS works, and can relate to the issues around clinical engagement. The intuitive, easy-to-use, logical technology has been key to the delivery of the system."
The system, which is currently deployed in 35 wards including medicine, ENT (ear, nose and throat) and orthopaedics is an add-on to the existing browser based MAXIMS clinical solution that is widely in use at RCHT, and links to the trust’s Patient Administration System.
Shane Tickell, CEO of IMS MAXIMS, added: "Royal Cornwall is a very forward-thinking trust who understands the benefits that technology can bring to healthcare, and this deployment demonstrates their ambitions to provide the highest quality care to patients, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
"We recognise that no two healthcare organisations - and no two clinicians - are exactly alike in how they work, and our tailor-led approach means we created a solution which matched Royal Cornwall's bespoke needs and ensured it was scalable when rolling out across the whole organisation."
About Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust
The Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust is the principal provider of acute care services in the county of Cornwall. It serves a population of around 450,000 people, a figure often doubled by holidaymakers during the busiest times of the year. The trust employs approximately 4,700 staff and has a budget of approximately £300 million.
The trust is responsible for the provision of services at three sites (comprising approximately 750 beds):
- Royal Cornwall Hospital, Treliske, Truro
- West Cornwall Hospital, Penzance
- St Michael's Hospital, Hayle.
The trust has teaching hospitals status as part of the Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry (PCMD). Keeping at the forefront medical advances, the trust has led developments in many clinical areas, and is committed to maximising the range of specialist care that can be offered locally.
About IMS MAXIMS
IMS MAXIMS is an electronic patient record provider working towards better, safer patient care. Specialists in developing clinical and administrative software solutions for healthcare providers, IMS MAXIMS currently supports more than 150 organisations, 11 million patient records in the UK, and 1.9 million patient records in Ireland, approx 50% of the population, as well as 20,000 users of IMS MAXIMS products.
MAXIMS is at the heart of the clinical and administrative life of everything from large UK and Irish hospitals, to small specialist independent clinics. It gives patient data to clinicians in exactly the format they need, and allows it to be shared with colleagues and updated in real-time. MAXIMS suits any clinical specialism and is excellent for order communications and reporting. Medical and administrative records can be kept fully up to date, with the minimum of effort. MAXIMS is web-based so there is no need to install software on computers or invest in expensive extra hardware.