4-page Case Study - Posted 10/9/2006
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Spanish Hospital Optimises Patient Care and Streamlines Drug Administration with Solution
Located in Madrid, the Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital uses the latest technologies to improve its services to the community. One of its more recent projects aimed to reduce the risks associated with the administration of medicine to patients. The previous solution didn’t fully meet the needs of healthcare professionals because it couldn’t track patient care from beginning to end. The hospital needed a system that thoroughly monitored the administration of medication to patients by nurses. It implemented a scalable solution based on Microsoft® Internet Security and Acceleration Server 2004, Microsoft BizTalk® Server 2004, Microsoft Windows Mobile® technology, and radio frequency identification. The new system keeps records secure, while helping employees to work more efficiently and spend more time with patients.
Situation
Located in Madrid, Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital, which has 1,800 beds and employs 8,000 people across its 22 buildings, is committed to improving patient care by modernising its facilities. One of the first steps in this process was to reduce errors by automating medicine delivery—from prescription to administration. The hospital established an electronic prescription programme toward the end of 2003.
José Antonio Rodríguez Maniega, Deputy Manager of Information Systems at Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital, says: “The programme incorporates a series of warnings and filters. It checks medication against the patient’s record, notifies the doctor of any allergies, and calculates the appropriate dose. In addition, it integrates a series of guide protocols according to the type of illness.”
The system also automated the dispensation phase at the pharmacy, delivering prescriptions to nurses quickly. Medicine could only be accessed from its cabinet when a nurse entered a personal code and patient reference number. The dose dispensed was limited strictly to the dosage originally prescribed for the patient.
Although the system reduced risk considerably, it did not address errors in the final administration of medicines by nurses. María Sanjurjo, Pharmacy Department Manager at Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital, says: “These errors are the hardest to predict because the nurse is alone with the patient, and no other healthcare professional is there to correct mistakes.”
If a nurse accidentally administers an incorrect dose or confuses patient medications, the consequences can be very serious. “We have 1,800 beds with an average of five or six prescriptions per patient, and each drug is taken three times a day, so we are talking about tens of thousands of daily administrations,” Sanjurjo says. “Mistakes are a possibility we needed to eliminate.”
Solution
Gregorio Marañón turned to Microsoft® Gold Certified Partner Fujitsu to create an ideal solution for its needs. Fujitsu implemented a system based on Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2004 Enterprise Edition for connectivity and security, Microsoft BizTalk® Server 2004, and radio frequency identification (RFID) technology.
RFID uses radio waves transmitted through tags to store and retrieve information remotely. In the hospital, tags were labelled on medicine doses and tied around patients’ wrists.
Using Pocket PCs based on Microsoft Windows Mobile® 2003, or Microsoft Windows® XP Tablet PC Edition mobile devices, healthcare professionals can now identify the drugs prescribed and administered to patients. Their RFID tags pull information from the hospital’s existing electronic-prescription application.
Rodríguez Maniega says: “At the time of administration, nurses carry mobile devices equipped with RFID and Wi-Fi readers and validate critical data wirelessly. If there is an error, the programme signals it immediately.”
With the mobile devices, hospital employees can access and manage information in real time from any location. The devices offer an easy-to-use interface, which helps users to consult patient records, check administered doses, and verify patient and medicine RFID labels quickly and easily.
BizTalk Server 2004 is a business process management server that helps the hospital automate and optimise these processes. It also integrates the different programmes and solutions in place, including:
- The Hospital Information System database, where medical records are stored.
- The Fujitsu-Siemens server cluster, which provides optimum availability of information.
- The computers in the pharmacy department that print medicine labels.
- The electronic prescription programme and the mobile devices and bracelets with RFID chips that identify patients.
Because the security of patient information is vital, the hospital chose ISA Server 2004 to enhance network performance and provide a powerful, secure, and easy-to-administer Internet gateway.
Benefits
By automating its medicine-administration system, Gregorio Marañón has improved its operations significantly. The solution increases overall efficiency, saves time, and, most importantly, helps healthcare professionals improve standards dramatically by reducing the risk of human error.
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We can scan and read the label through bedding or clothing. There is no need to disturb the patient, and the process is much faster. |
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José Antonio Rodríguez Maniega
Deputy Manager of Information Systems Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital |
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Data Access Ensures Optimum Patient Care
The new solution has helped professionals reduce the risks associated with administering medicine and thereby satisfy the hospital’s aim to deliver the best possible service to patients. Because healthcare professionals can access critical data at any time from any location, they no longer have to locate information on desktop computers and can spend more time caring for patients at the bedside. With real-time updates, the medical information is always current and accurate. Doctors can now make decisions—such as vary dosage levels or change prescriptions—while they’re with a patient, which boosts care levels and reassures patients at every stage.
RFID labels are also flexible and comfortable for patients. Rodríguez Maniega says: “We can scan and read the label through bedding or clothing. There is no need to disturb the patient, and the process is much faster.”
System Cuts Costs with Improved Efficiency
At a time when hospitals are struggling to serve communities in the face of funding cuts, efficiency is critical. With the new solution, doctors and administrators at Gregorio Marañón no longer have to spend valuable time exchanging patient data, which lowers the hospital’s labour costs. And because they are now spending less time on administrative work, they can concentrate on more patient-focused tasks and medical research.
María Andión Goñi, Head of Nursing at Gregorio Marañón, says: “Aside from risk management, the added value of the technology is that it eliminates bureaucratic work for the nurses, so we have much more time to maintain a direct relationship with the patient.”
Health professionals can concentrate on strategic tasks because the new solution reduces concerns of lesser importance. “Employees are used to being under enormous pressure,” says Andión Goñi. “Relying on the new solution provides peace of mind and allows employees to focus on what they do best.”
Intuitive Technology Eases Adoption
Employees at Gregorio Marañón felt immediately at ease with the mobile devices, regardless of whether they had used new technologies before. With such intuitive, familiar interfaces, users adopted the new technology quickly, which cut training costs. “This solution creates a very user-friendly environment, which is not complicated at all,” says Andión Goñi. “All our employees who have worked with the new solution are very comfortable with it.”
New Solution Improves Integration
Hospitals are usually composed of independent units. The use of BizTalk Server 2004 at Gregorio Marañón helps streamline processes across previously fragmented structures.
Rodríguez Maniega says: “In our hospital, there are many applications specific to each department based on different technologies. With BizTalk Server 2004, we can integrate numerous hospital applications across the organisation, which ensures healthcare professionals can access information directly, rather than rely on more time-consuming and less accurate methods. They can then analyse the information in ways that meet their needs.”
Scalable Solution Ready for Future Projects
Gregorio Marañón is always looking for new ways to improve its services. The flexible and scalable Microsoft infrastructure ensures the hospital is now ideally set up to adopt further deployments and integrate new systems.
Andión Goñi says: “We hope to implement new, efficient solutions, such as one that controls the movement of patients in the hospital. One of the reasons we chose the Microsoft-based infrastructure is that it offers a strong platform on which to build or integrate new applications in the future.”
For More Information
For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to: http://www.microsoft.com/
For more information about Fujitsu products and services visit the Web site at: http://www.fujitsu.com/
For more information about Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital products and services visit the Web site at: http://www.hggm.es/
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This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY. Microsoft, BizTalk, Windows, Windows Mobile, the Windows logo, and Windows Server are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
