Yale-New Haven Hospital hopes to streamline communication while providing healthcare staff secure access to patient data in real-time through a smartphone app.
The Mobile Heartbeat Clinical Urgent Response software will be used in Yale-New Haven Health System (YNHH) facilities to improve communications among a patient's caregiver team and keep the team updated on a patient's treatment, according to a report in the Yale Daily News. Staffers will be provided iPhones to use the app, which has a license agreement for 4,000 device installations.
The smartphone technology will let caregivers reach out to other team members in real-time without having to use a pager to locate a team member, Jason Malia, assistant manager in the Pediatric Emergency Department at YNHH, tells Yale Daily News.
The system should prove less intrusive and boost patient experience, Malia says. The app also gives caregivers quick access to patient data without the need to find a nearby workstation and will alert physicians on available test reports. The app will also issue notifications to team members when a patient's condition changes.
"We envision the smartphone platform to be the workstation of the future," Edward Fisher, vice president and chief technology officer at YNHH tells the Daily News, adding system deployment across YNHH facilities will happen in the next two years.
Hospitals and healthcare facilities nationwide are increasingly embracing smartphone devices and apps to enhance collaboration and patient care. A Florida healthcare provider is using a mobile app and tablets to foster better communication among caregivers and enhance its patients' hospital experiences. In addition, a New Jersey medical center has even created its own mHealth app bar, a la Apple's retail store, to provide patients, staff and visitors tech support and training on mobile software and devices.
At YNHH, once the smartphone app is running well, the goal is to expand the technology into the hands of physicians outside of YNHH to allow primary care doctors the same communications capabilities with patient teams, according to the article.
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