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To compliment last week’s post, I want to take a step beyond theoretical analysis of telehealth approaches and share real results with real hospital systems after over 100,000 video consults in the emergency department.
Health systems using EmOpti are consistently achieving impressive results across a wide variety of measures. These include:
Clinical Metrics Improvement: Patient throughput measures that have shown improvement include door-to-provider time, total length of stay and in particular length of stay for discharged patients, and rates of patients that leave without being seen. An example of the types of benefits seen are depicted below.
Decreased Variability: Use of EmOpti and remote resources has been shown to provide an elasticity in capacity and load-balancing capability across multiple departments. As a result, on high-volume days that previously created overload and deterioration in throughput metrics, departments are able to manage the higher volume and maintain those metrics as in the example below:
On days with high quartile volume, mean length of stay deteriorates and variability worsens, but not when EmOpti technology is used to provide variable capacity.
Staff Cost Savings: The elasticity in capacity that results from the use of remote resources allows staff schedules to be adjusted closer to the expected needs for a mean volume day, creating an opportunity for savings in staff costs that are often at least 10-15%. These savings can be realized by either adjusting current schedules or by accommodating significant census growth without need to add staff or additional treatment rooms.
Addition of remote resources allows on site staffing to be optimized, reducing excessive staffing on low volume days while also maintaining high performance on busy days.
Incremental Income: Capturing patients that otherwise leave without being seen creates an immediate incremental income opportunity. No longer does a 2% rate of LWBS need to be considered status quo. And the improved reputation for service at some facilities deploying EmOpti has led to census increases and increased market share compared to other facilities in the same region. In larger health systems millions of dollars in incremental income can be realized.
Patient Experience: Patient satisfaction surveys, carried out directly by nurses on patients as they leave a facility that utilizes EmOpti, and by third-party survey companies such as Press Ganey, have consistently shown improved scores.
Provider Experience: Providers repeatedly tell how the remote shifts are very rewarding, as they are able to fully utilize their training, make clinical decisions without interruptions or distractions, and be highly productive. In many cases, it has been seen that the number of consults provided per hour by a remote provider is virtually double the number seen when the same process occurs using in-person staff:
This chart shows the productivity of an actual remote physician using EmOpti throughout a double shift, acting as a virtual physician in triage across three emergency departments.
EmOpti’s solutions for optimizing workflow and clinician productivity in acute care settings represent a new standard for healthcare operations. The technology is cost-effective, requires minimal time and effort from busy hospital IT personnel, improves both patient and provider experience, and results in a high return on investment.