Tag Archives: LOS

Top 8 Benefits of Proactive Patient Flow Optimization

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DanH avatar_34902-300x300

Dan Hickman ProModel CTO

Unpredictably high numbers of scheduled admissions and an uncertain number of available beds.

Stressed staff due to ED boarding, long patient wait times, and off-service placements.

Length of stay and cost per case metrics exceed CMS value-based care efficiency measures.

Sound familiar? 

Patient flow optimization is one of the most cost-effective ways to improve operational effectiveness, the patient stay experience and your hospital’s bottom line. Here’s how.

Top 8 Reasons to Implement Patient Flow Optimization Today

  1. Decrease the Length of Stay (LOS). Find “hidden discharges” (potential candidates for discharge based on diagnosis codes and average LOS metrics) in your current census.
  2. Improve Bottleneck and ADT Issue Visibility. Simply having data does not empower decision makers. In fact, too much data can cause clinical operations staff to ignore it altogether. A patient flow optimization system delivers visual data all hospital staff can easily digest and use to make informed decisions that benefit the hospital and the patients.
  3. Right-size Staffing. By coupling accurate census predictions with staff needs, your health system will experience lower labor costs based on predictable admit, discharge and transfer (ADT) cycles, optimal staffing sizes and diminished demand for expensive nursing agency personnel.
  4. Enhance the Patient Journey. Minimize patient frustration by admitting the vast majority of inpatients to on-service units, even during peak periods.
  5. Capture Additional Revenue. Decreasing length of stay increases bed capacity, so fewer patients leave the hospital without being seen.
  6. Increase Access to Care. Patient flow optimization decreases ED boarding duration, speeds up admissions, and lowers left without being seen (LWBS) rates.
  7. Lower Infrastructure Costs. With patient flow optimization, health systems make optimal use of the existing hospital’s physical footprint, avoiding unnecessary costly build outs.
  8. Staff Satisfaction. Welcome to the stress-free huddle. FutureFlow Rx gives your staff a personal heads-up on issues affecting admissions, discharges and transfers, so they can be addressed at huddle meetings. Prescriptive corrective actions from the patient flow optimization system further empower staff with recommendations based on data and simulation.

 

About FutureFlow Rx™ Patient Flow Optimization

FutureFlow Rx by ProModel uses historical patient flow patterns, real-time clinical data, and discrete event simulation to reveal key trends, provide operational insights, and deliver specific corrective action recommendations to enhance the patient stay experience, lower costs and drive additional revenues. Our platform accurately predicts future events, helping hospitals make the right operational decisions to reduce risk, decrease LOS and improve operational margins. Schedule a demo.

dashboard 300 dpi

 FutureFlow Rx’s dashboard consists of  key performance indicator (KPI) “cards”. The left side of each card shows the last 24 hours; the right side predicts the “Next 24”; and clicking the upper right “light bulbs” provides prescriptive actions to improve the predicted future.

 

Wanted – Hospitals Not Getting Enough ROI From Their EMR, RTLS, ADT, HIT Systems

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Dan Hickman ProModel CTO

Dan Hickman ProModel CTO

Developing custom software is a real passion of mine. I like nothing better than to shut my door, go dark on the world around me and just code. Unfortunately as CTO of ProModel, I rarely get to do that. However, I am getting that chance right now since we are developing, and close to releasing, the first version of a custom prescriptive analytic platform designed to help improve the flow of patients throughout a hospital.

Finding and tackling enterprise level process problems via analytic software has become a real strength of the company. We have done this for the Department of Defense over the last eight years with three very specific applications, AST, DST, NST and more recently for an industry leading ship building defense contractor, but I digress.

Hospital patient flow product development is a little different however, as the four projects above were all built for a single customer. The patient flow product is being developed for every hospital that wants to improve patient throughput.  We have had an outstanding beta partner who is a cutting edge hospital when it comes to embracing technology on the process improvement side of life.  All hospitals want to be cutting edge when it comes to their clinical equipment and patient procedures, but that is not always the case with work flow and process improvement.

So this project is really being developed as a “tweener”. It’s eventually going to be valuable for almost every hospital, but right now we are developing it based on the most urgent needs of our beta partner.   This brings me to my request. We are now ready for two more beta partners to help influence the design of this software.  Our near term vision for the next phase of the product is to have it indirectly connect with ADT and RTLS systems in order to maximize your investment in the data you are already collecting, but probably not getting much out of. At least that is what the hospitals we have been talking to over the last year or so have told us.

So, if you are a forward thinking hospital, who wants more ROI from your existing data systems and is willing to work with us to get you there, we will give our next two qualified beta partners the software free for the first year .   If you want to discuss it with me just shoot me an email at dhickman@promodel.com

Thanks,

Dan Hickman