See how Austco has successfully implemented clinical workflow solutions
Great to be part of such an important project. While it is a small extension to the existing system, at such a difficult and important time for parents and family, just being a small part of this essential service for SANDS made it even more important to get it just right.
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Great to see another project completed and the ICU looking good.
This article was published in Health Estate Journal (HEJ) – Journal of the Institute of Healthcare and Engineering and Estate Management (March 2022 Volume 76 Number 3)
Thames Hospice’s new-build £22 million hospice, located on an eight-acre site by Bray lake in Maidenhead, features a specially adapted Austco nurse call system that allows patients to call for a nurse via an Amazon Echo (‘Alexa’) system, rather than having to press a button.
Initially the company’s standard nurse call system was installed as part of the construction of the hospice, which opened in October 2020. However, following a visit to Austco’s demonstration facility, staff saw an innovation they believed was a ‘must have’ for their patients.
Austco Communications Solutions Specialist explained: “Our engineers integrated our Tacera solution with Amazon Echo system to allow patients to call for a nurse. The usual buttons/handsets etc are still there, but the convenience – particularly for patients that may not have the strength to press a button – enables nurses to be alerted should the patient need them. All the patients have to do is call out ‘Alexa, help,’ and a call for that room is raised on the nurse call system. The entertainment system interprets the command, and, when recognised, sends a signal to the nurse call system. The two systems work together so that the source of the command can be translated into an alarm for the correct room. The call appears on the system as if the patient had pressed the call button. On entering the room, the nurse presses the ‘presence’ button, and can cancel the alarm from there. Patients also get the usual entertainment options the system offers in their room.”
“When our engineers visited the hospice, clinical staff explained that sometimes, when helping a patient, for example in a bathroom, they couldn’t always see the origin of a second call just raised. We addressed this by incorporating our mobile solution, Pulse Mobile (‘a native smartphone app that lets nurses manage alarms, and remote control the nurse call system, all from their personal smartphone’).”
At the request of the hospice’s staff, the engineers subsequently also configured the connection of bed mats to the nurse call system.
“Finally, there was a requirement during the pandemic to incorporate a COVID call onto the system in areas where the infection was present. With the system software-based, we were able to programme a new call type to allow for this. All of this clearly highlights the benefits of a modular system to which additional features can be added, as required, over time.”
To donate to Thames Hospice charity, please visit their website.
To read more of the March issue of HEJ, click here.
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Jurong Health Campus and Ng Teng Fong General Hospital, part of the National University Health System in Singapore, is HIMSS (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society) first ever Davies Award winner from maritime Southeast Asia. The HIMSS Davies Award of Excellence recognizes the thoughtful application of health information and technology to substantially improve clinical care delivery, patient outcomes and population health around the world.
JurongHealth and Austco Marketing & Service Asia Pte Ltd. formed a strategic partnership when Austco Tacera solution was chosen for their new state-of-the-art facility in Singapore. Read our case study about the JurongHealth campus
About HIMSS
HIMSS (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society) is a global advisor, thought leader and member-based society committed to reforming the global health ecosystem through the power of information and technology. As a mission-driven non-profit, HIMSS offers a unique depth and breadth of expertise in health innovation, public policy, workforce development, research and digital health transformation to advise leaders, stakeholders and influencers across the global health ecosystem on best practices. With a community-centric approach, our innovation engine delivers key insights, education and engaging events to healthcare providers, payers, governments, startups, life sciences and other health services organizations, ensuring they have the right information at the point of decision. HIMSS has served the global health community for more than 60 years, with focused operations across North America, Europe, the United Kingdom, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.
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Another large project completed, and on site this week with the clinical team to fine tweak the software and ensure the system is operating based on their working processes and procedures. Great work David Furnell and Robbie Atkin.
All NHS Hospital projects have to start somewhere, and it doesn’t look pretty at the start and certainly nothing like a Healthcare environment. Much work goes on behind the scenes to ensure quality and at the end of the day patient safety is achieved, and this is organised by the Main Contractor working with the NHS teams and Subcontractors like ourselves. It doesn’t look pretty now, but watch this space for images of the end product when the project completes in the New Year.
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JurongHealth and Austco Marketing & Service Asia Pte Ltd. formed a strategic partnership when Austco’s Tacera solution was chosen for their new state-of-the-art facility in Singapore. The JurongHealth Campus is comprised of the 700-bed Ng Teng Fong General Hospital (NTFGH) and 400-bed Jurong Community Hospital (JCH). The hospitals were designed and built together from the ground up as an integrated development to complement each other for better patient care, greater efficiency and reduced operational costs. 
The Tacera solution designed for JurongHealth offers a range of features and functionality to help improve patient outcomes, operational workflows, and execute JurongHealth’s mission; To advance healthcare by synergizing technology, education and research in partnership with patients and the community. Tacera is the only Nurse Call solution on the market that delivers VoIP Internet Protocol to the patient’s bedside, providing the foundation for future products and services using internet-based protocols.
A key benefit of the Tacera solution is its seamless integration as the trigger component of the Integrated Code Blue System that delivers the fastest Code Blue rapid response of any hospital in Singapore. The time from the initial code blue trigger to when an Intensive Care Specialist arrives to treat a patient has been reduced from 7-10 minutes to 2.6-2.8 minutes, which means the patient is treated within the “Golden 5 Minutes͟,” thereby reducing the risk of hypoxic brain damage and improving chances of a full recovery.
Earlier this year, a media briefing was held to share the results of a study pertaining to JurongHealth’s Code Blue initiative. A first-of-its-kind in Singapore, the initiative was a collective effort by various teams to deploy a variety of rapid response systems, enhanced activation parameters and improved workflows to save lives at Ng Teng Fong General Hospital (NTFGH).
“Since we have deployed the Tacera emergency call system, the risk of sudden cardiac arrest in our hospital has dropped from 1.39 per 1,000 people two years ago to 0.79 per 1,000 people this year, while our occupancy rate during the same period has increased by 21%,” said Dr. Chen Zhijie, director of the Nursing Department of Ng Teng Fong General Hospital. “This is a big improvement.”
The survival rate of patients has also been increased from the original 6.6% to 20%. Seventy percent of patients will have symptoms 6 to 8 hours before cardiac arrest. Once symptoms such as abnormal breathing, heart rhythms and elevated blood pressure are detected, the emergency call system will automatically initiate a call to the Quick Response team. The survival rate of these patients has been increased from the original 42% to more than 70%.
At present, all beds at Ng Teng Fong General Hospital are equipped with a Tacera emergency call button. JurongHealth intends to adopt artificial intelligence technology in the future, which will allow the system to automatically diagnose the patient according to their systems and provide detailed information for the response team to further improve survival rates.
CHI St. Luke’s Health – Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center (formerly St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital) has been a leader in the Texas healthcare community and on the forefront of new advances in heart health and technology for more than 60 years. CHI St. Luke’s Health (formerly St. Luke’s Episcopal Health System) contributes to enhancing community health by delivering superior value in high-quality, cost-effective acute care. As a community teaching hospital and a tertiary referral centre, the Hospital serves both the greater Houston area and the global community.
When it came time to begin renovations on their medical tower in Houston, they wanted a Nurse Call system with leading-edge technology. Ensuring faster response times by nurses to patients was one of the main requirements for the new Nurse Call system. St. Luke’s was looking for a solution with a flexible range of call types, alarms, and display options that embrace today’s IP technology.
St. Luke’s chose Austco to install an all-in-one patient station, which provided the flexibility and range of options needed to help facilitate the first steps in faster response times. Each patient station can be configured for a private or semi-private room with varying levels of call types. This allows the nursing staff to discern between patient calls, staff assist, and code calls with ease. Having “clean mode” and “cord out” distinction allows for fewer false calls.
A favorite feature of the nursing staff is the colored alphanumeric LED Annunciators. The LED Annunciators provide an audio and visual notification of all active calls by displaying a text message with the alarm information, as well as sounding an accompanying alert tone based on the priority of the call.
In November 2012, St. Luke’s received its ISO 9001:208 certification for compliance with the quality management system under the American National Standards. The three key requirements that St. Luke’s was able to achieve were providing consistent patient care, improving patient satisfaction, and continually improving goal-based performance. St. Luke’s has been able to fully implement their Austco Nurse Call system in seven areas of the medical tower (160 beds).
“ATIntegration [an Austco Retail partner] has been able to customize the Austco Nurse Call System to fit the needs of this area of the facility by making the system as quiet as possible so as ot to disturb the patients,” said Debbie Mathews is the Nurse Manager on the VIP Floor of St. Luke’s. “As soon as a call is activated, a message is sent directly to pagers that each staff carry with them. This ensures fast response times for staff. Two years ago, we were not talking about response times. Today, I can go and produce a report to show the response times. I love the system, and Ron’s exceptional service; he goes above and beyond.”
Austco Retail Partner: Advanced Technology Integration
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William Osler Health System’s Brampton Civic Hospital is an open, accessible, public hospital which provides the community with a modern facility, advanced medical equipment and a comp equipment and a comprehensive range of health services. In addition to paving the way for advanced health care, Brampton Civic Hospital is the largest health care infrastructure project completed in Canada and is one of the first green-field hospitals built this century.
This cutting-edge facility offers increased capacity, providing improved access to safe and high quality health services for the community’s growing population. Patients are more comfortable, with larger, more attractive rooms that are spacious enough to accommodate family members. The massive 1.2 million sq. ft. facility is located in Brampton, Ontario, just west of Toronto and was built to accommodate 608 beds and 18 operating rooms and is the centre of innovation, electronic health records and ultramodern technology.
Brampton Civic Hospital replaced an outdated hospital built in 1923 and was designed with the goal of improving the quality, safety, speed and accountability of care to meet standards recently set by the Province of Ontario.
Anna Morgado, Clinical Informatics Analyst at Brampton Civic was involved with implementation and training of the newly installed Austco Nurse Call system and symbol device integration prior to the hospital’s grand opening. At the old hospital, Anna had worked with another nurse call system which she described described as “a box and a bell”. She shares a story from the old hospital of an event where a “ghost bell” was activated and none of the nurses could locate the origin of the call. Through process of elimination, staff went room-to-room pulling out call cords before finally locating the mystery call bell.
The new hospital needed a reliable nurse call system that would allow staff the ability to provide the highest quality of patient care with optimal responsiveness to patient needs, enhance staff efficiency and mobility plus, reduce intrusive overhead paging creating a quieter environment. The solution would need toto provide an efficient way of answering call bells.
Brampton Civic Hospital implemented an IP Nurse Call System from Austco for its operational flexibility and reliability. The hospital contains over 2800 Call Points (washroom pull cords and patient push buttons), 1600 over-door lights and 50 master stations stations supplied by Austco as well as 500 of Austco’s multi-function pillow speakers for nurse call, TV/Radio and light control.
The nurse call system incorporates a comprehensive range of call types and priority levels while the integrated software solution is the glue that streamlines and enhances the communication efficiencies with the nurse call system. This event notification, escalation and reporting application provides the hospital’s management management teams with detailed reports on staff response times, number of escalated calls and call frequency. These simple-to-use reports are generated as needed and provide valuable data to support patient safety and satisfaction.
In some of the units at Brampton Civic, patient requests are routed directly to a designated nurse’s wireless device where he/she is able to communicate with the patient immediately. For calls of a non-urgent nature, the nurse can acknowledge the call in real-time and can either pick up a requested item along the way, or simply answer a question without visiting the room at all. The result is an increase in patient satisfaction, an increase in nurse productivity and staff members no longer need to send noisy overhead pages to locate a nurse which creates a more quiet and healing environment.
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