Hospice care is one of the fastest growing categories in healthcare delivery. As our population grows, ages and the diagnosis of fatal illness rises. With a more enlightened view of care at the end of life, more and more individuals and families are opting for hospice care in home, often provided by health aides whose work is guided by physicians and nurses.
Presenting at the Mobile Health Expo in Oct., Fred Cruz, IT director at American Hospice, discussed how his organization has taken the lead in providing care givers in the field mobile devices, applications and secure network connectivity in order to make their jobs easier and to improve the quality and consistency of service. American Hospice, one of the oldest hospice organizations in the US, supports 800 employees, of whom 500 are mobile provides an application that integrates a simple “task list” with each patient’s record, through a simple “hop on, hop off” connection using a mobile device that updates and synchronizes in near-real time.
“Before, our hundreds of employees in the field worked hard all day long, then went home and had to fill out reams of paperwork,” Cruz said. “Today, they simply connect with our enterprise application directly after a visit with a patient in order to upload the latest information and activities. This data is available to the patient’s central physician and nursing team, who can help guide care much more efficiently and accurately. The time we save on filing paperwork, related data entry, and more can now be spent with the patients – and the satisfaction level of our employees has risen dramatically as we’ve made their lives much easier.”
Putting the system in place was not without its challenges, according to Cruz. He and his team met obstacles with outdated software, fragmented licensing agreements, ensuring 100% compliance with HIPPA and other industry standards, in addition to tightening budgets given the tough economy. After M&A activity, American Hospice also had undergone a change in management and related strategy and philosophy, which Cruz was excited about – the change lead to a $3 million project preceding the mobile platform completed this year, to extend the initial “paperless” initiative beyond just billing.
It took approximately 18 months to complete the primary project supporting employees mainly in American Hospice offices – the only staff members still using paper were the remote care givers.
“About a year ago, Allscripts came out with an app for home health aids that could run on a Windows Mobile-based device,” Cruz explained. “We liked the app very much, and decided to invest in that as well as the HTC (News - Alert) Touch 2 device, testing the system in closed network environment over our internal wireless network.”
Cruz ran into problems with their current firewall vendor, which slowed the project down. Connecting into the network using these mobile devices became problematic, particularly given the Company’s very tight security policies as well as our desire to ensure the applications were perfectly integrated so the promise of automation was truly met.
Through another Allscripts customer, Cruz learned about NCP engineering. “The team at NCP got our connectivity working in a day – and completed the integration in three days. We were obviously thrilled!”
“This was a great project,” said Martin Hack, EVP, NCP engineering. “We knew American Hospice could gain huge advantages, and that the people in the field would feel so much more connected to their supporting team. We also knew how important it was to ensure that it would be easy for the workers to connect to the network, literally in seconds, while also keeping it easy for the IT and HR teams to manage the administrative side. The secure mobile VPN approach we took serves well, and we look forward to many years of further development with American Hospice as more and more applications come on-line that will improve the quality of care and life for the patients, and the quality of service and collaboration for the care givers.”
Asked about expansion, Cruz was passionate about the opportunity to enhance mobile care with features including video conferencing and consults using 4G devices and network access down the road. “Imagine one of our care givers at home with a patient who may have complications – rather than as the physician or nurse to drive out, or bring the patient to a facility – a real-time diagnosis can take place, including viewing of a wound, for example, or having a conversation with a patient or their family members.”
Cruz realizes this may be years away, but also remarked that the pace of mobile healthcare technology and connectivity is clearly accelerating, based on his attendance at the conference last week.
“Building security into the delivery of mobile healthcare services – at the architectural level – is key to a sustainable platform,” Hack added. “We know that the investments we are making now in ensuring connectivity works – reliably and securely – will pave the way for future applications that will make a huge difference in the way health care workers perform their jobs, and the way their patients are treated. We’re helping improve the information flow, while opening up time for the human contact that is so critical especially to hospice patients fortunate to have access to compassionate professionals, who shouldn’t have to worry about paperwork but instead can benefit from being – and feeling – more connected to home base.”
Cynthia Artin is president of ArtinArts . She has been helping companies to grow through strategic consulting, communications and market positioning for 30 years.
Cynthina Artin is Managing Director at Auster Capital Partners. To read more of her articles on TMCnet, please visit her columnist page.Edited by
Erin Monda