Five ways patient flow can be improved with a digital task management solution
Efficient patient flow is about managing patients’ journeys through different stages of care inside a hospital - with minimal delays. What happens in community care can have a knock-on effect on the situation inside a hospital, so patient flow begins even before a patient comes through the hospital doors, and carries on out of it.
Why is patient flow management important?
Poor patient flow can result in challenging scenarios for healthcare providers, including emergency departments crowded with patients waiting to be transferred or admitted, patients being admitted to hospital wards not best-suited to their care (e.g. a cardiac patient admitted to a gastroenterology ward), inpatients being moved around to different wards to try and squeeze in new admissions, as well as a delay to theatre.
All of the above can lead to poor patient experience, high pressure and stress for staff, and worse clinical outcomes.
It doesn’t need to be this way. Innovations in digital task management solutions can have significant positive impact on patient flow management, and as a result more healthcare organisations are considering these tools. Here, we discuss five ways that digital task management solutions, like Infinity Health’s, are supporting improved control of patient flow.
1. Care is more integrated
Patients are often seen by multiple health and care professionals across a variety of departments before, during and after a hospital stay. With a digital task management solution that allows real-time sharing of information, accessible by all relevant professionals from anywhere, multidisciplinary teams can work together more effectively to meet their patients’ needs. This improved access to knowledge supports improved collaboration and prioritisation, which can help improve decision-making and patient flow management.
2. Patients are transferred more quickly
When streamlined clinical task management is made possible through digital solutions like Infinity, the transfer of patients is accelerated - getting them to where they need to be more quickly and more efficiently. Clinical and operational staff can be granted access to real-time updates, meaning that once a medical decision is made, the physical transportation of the patient to another part of the hospital is easier to coordinate.
3. Delays and blockages are easier to identify
With real-time visibility of all activity, from bed-management to granular task-level, ward and site managers can understand where there might be unnecessary delays or blockages, and more effectively respond to them. For example, it is clear to see the reason that a patient discharge or transfer is delayed, so better patient flow management decisions can be made. This may also have a positive impact on patient transfers as appropriate beds become available.
4. Bed management is less time-consuming
Admissions, discharges, and transfers are automatically recorded, removing the need for bed managers to spend time visiting and calling wards to ascertain upcoming discharges and transfers. Admissions and other transfers are therefore much easier and less time-consuming to plan and coordinate, bed management is more efficient, and patient flow is improved.
5. Medically fit patients can be discharged sooner
Discharge delays and increased demand contribute to poor patient flow. Health and social care systems that have adopted best patient flow management practice find themselves much better able to cope with external pressures than those that have not.
A digital task management solution like Infinity allows medical staff to see the status of a patient at a glance, as well as what action or treatments are required before discharge is possible. For example, a patient may be medically fit for discharge, but need medication to take home before they can leave hospital. If the pharmacy team had access to a digital task management solution, they could easily see which patients were waiting on a prescription as a last step before discharge and prioritise it; thus creating better patient flow back into the community.
Patient flow management solutions are vital
The last 12 months have been extraordinary, and in many ways have helped healthcare organisations - particularly the NHS - take leaps forward that may have otherwise taken years. However, healthcare systems are now under enormous pressure to “catch-up” and reduce the backlog of patients waiting for care.
Now more than ever, managing patient flow in hospitals - and beyond - is vital to support hospitals and community organisations manage their patients as efficiently and safely as possible. Digital task management, with the objective of patient flow management, has to be part of that story.
We can help you
If you’re interested in learning more about our digital patient flow management solution, want to talk through your challenges or simply would like to arrange a demo of Infinity, please get in touch with our team via our contact page or by emailing us at [email protected].
You can read more about Infinity for patient flow management, caseload management, and clinical communications here.
