2. 2
Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Sometimes, the brave new world of
managed healthcare feels like that,
doesn’t it?
Hospitals and providers are being
pushed simultaneously toward mutually
exclusive ends. On one hand, payers,
regulators, and patients expect you to
provide a pleasant, patient-centric “user
experience” and positive treatment
outcomes. On the other, you’re expected
to not just contain, but aggressively cut
costs, reduce lengths of stay, and meet a
plethora of KPI metrics. It feels like being
caught between fiscal austerity on the
supply side, skilled caregiver shortages
in the center, and a well-informed patient
population on the demand side ready
to tweet or post at the first wrong meal
order. Capping it all is the financial and
reputational success of your hospital.
And, perhaps, your job.
It’s a complex set of challenges, and no
single approach can fully address it and
lead you to comprehensive success. But
there are meaningful, manageable steps
you can take that impact significant
parts of that challenge to deliver positive,
welcomed outcomes.
The connected patient
What if – with relative simplicity
and without major operational or IT
restructuring – you could successfully
address these competing objectives of
better care delivery, more thorough,
current, and auditable records, and lower
costs? All while providing a safer, more
secure physical environment?
The Connected Patient is a concept
developed by Unify to bring the patient,
his or her care and its documentation,
and caregivers closer. This is mutual
immediate full disclosure – everything
everyone needs to know the moment
it’s needed. For inpatient and outpatient
situations, from patient referral, through
the course of care, through discharge and
follow up, each member of the care team
is aware of those aspects of the patient’s
status, in real time, which pertain to
them. For home care, both patients and
administrators always know whether
appointments are running on time or
falling behind. Patients are educated
about their condition and treatment plan
and can even be reminded to take their
medication, and to track whether it’s been
taken. Care providers know, with a glance
at their smart device, who on their team is
available for consultation, and
instantly connect with them and with
off-site experts.
3. 3
More than an idea
The tools to make this scenario a reality
for your healthcare operation are in use
around the world and available to you
now. Unify – formerly Siemens Enterprise
Communications – has developed them, a
combination of enterprise-grade general-
use communications solutions modified
for healthcare settings and specialty
solutions specifically for healthcare.
Unified communications (UC) is at the
heart of this new way to work. As the
name implies, UC unifies previously
disparate communications tools into a
single, seamless user experience: voice,
audio, and video conferencing, online
collaboration, messaging, and contact
center. Presence to show availability
of others on your team. One Number
Service, so calls follow you on the device
of your choice. All in a single, elegant
user experience, equally available at the
desktop or mobile device.
Bedside terminals provide a point-of-care
workflow solution which integrates the
power of UC (for both patient and care
giver) with electronic medical records
(EMR), electronic meal ordering (EMO),
patient education, and infotainment.
Sophisticated, flexible alarm and
alert solutions respond to an array of
automated and manual input to provide
notice of schedule interruptions,
disasters, major incidents, security
notifications, and more. This alarm
response system can work in conjunction
with high-volume dispatch systems
to instantly pull together large and
diverse on- and off-network teams,
including administrators, clinicians, first
responders, and government officials.
While Unify provides these capabilities
as fully-integrated turn-key solutions, we
have also developed them as component-
level solutions, to overlay and work with
existing infrastructure.
Lastly, we provide the services to design,
implement, manage, and maintain these
solutions as well as those from other
vendors.
4. 4
The patient experience – a more
hospitable hospital
Patients have become a rather demanding
lot, haven’t they? And why not? So have
we all. It’s the nature of our connected
world.
We have instantly at our fingertips what
was a short while ago unimaginably vast
amounts of information about virtually
anything – including what new services
other providers are leveraging to lure
customer-patients. How they feel about
their stay with you gets transmitted, fast
and far, to a social audience hungry to
know, and to share. And it’s not just your
customer-patients; regulators and payers
are measuring and reimbursing you on
an array of metrics, including patient
satisfaction. Control is migrating out from
providers to all these, with the consumer
increasingly trying to call the tune.
So, why not make the patient stay more
like another away-from-home experience?
Why not take a cue from hospitality?
Hotels know when a guest is scheduled
to arrive. Guests can check in online
and be sent their room number and a
virtual key by text message. At higher
end hotels, they’re greeted by name and
given directions to their room. Once
in the room, guests have access to the
internet and entertainment, they can
prepare for the next day’s meetings, order
room service and request a turn-down.
When ready to leave, they can check out
and even take an exit survey through the
television.
Why not do the same for their hospital
visit?
Informative welcoming
Your first salvo into creating a more
hospitality-oriented customer experience
can start the moment a patient enters
your facility. By integrating Unify’s
mobile client and alarm response
solution, you can push scheduling
reminders to patients at a predetermined
time or intervals and give them the
opportunity to accept, decline, or modify
an appointment. When appointments
run behind, you can send out a courtesy
notification and, if the delay crosses a
time threshold, even offer a suggestion to
enjoy a few moments at a nearby coffee
shop rather than your waiting room.
Further, you can enable patients’ smart
devices’ real-time locating system (RLTS)
capabilities (for instance, via automated
self-registration) to simultaneously
announce to appropriate staff their
arrival on premises while pushing arrival
instructions to your patient-customer.
Imagine the reaction to being greeted by
name when approaching the registration
desk. This is expectation-transcending,
hospitality-grade customer treatment.
5. 5
Engaged participants
Once at the bedside, the connected
patient is truly connected. You can
provide access to the internet, movies,
and other infotainment options. Studies
show patients provided these capabilities
– particularly more senior patients –
report significantly higher satisfaction
levels with their stay1
. From their bed,
they can order meals tailored to their
tastes and specific dietary conditions,
aided by pictures that provide a clearer
idea of what will be delivered, and
they can do so closer to mealtime than
is possible with paper systems. This
reduces meal waste, enhances patient
health through more complete nutrition
intake, and enables shorter patient stays.
To help patients become more
participatory in their treatment, these
point-of-care terminals provide in-
depth educational libraries so they can
learn more about their condition and
specific treatment recommendations.
Your hospital can also provide dynamic
surveys, tailored by condition or ward
to be more relevant to both the patient
and the hospital, and available for instant
analysis or review by stakeholders.
Research has shown that patients are
more likely to participate in electronic
surveys which appear more pertinent,
and which can be completed rapidly. By
observing and engaging in more detailed,
personalized patient care discussions
at the bedside, research suggests that
patients feel more positive about their
experience.2
Keeping track of what’s important
But these patient benefits aren’t limited
to infotainment. We can help you show
respect for your patient’s time – a
welcomed turn for patients, without
doubt. As a clinician makes his or her
rounds, the bedside terminal logon/
logout procedure can update “down-
stream” patients’ terminals or smart
phones to advise of the clinician’s
ETA status. (This is accomplished by
integration with Unify’s alarm response
system and the facility’s appointment
system.)
The same approach can be used in home
health or other off-site environments to
let both patients and staff know when a
home worker is running behind.
Taking these capabilities a step further,
by integrating alarm response and
Unify’s mobile UC client, alerts can be set
to help patients track medication intake,
including alerts when medication is
missed, and requiring acknowledgement.
Likewise, alerts can be set to remind
patients of self-guided therapy
treatment, or just simple appointments.
As it regards the patient, the goal in each
of these endeavors is to provide best-
practices care based on customer service
principles rather than administrative
process.
1
Luras, et al (2007). Long term care and Hospital LoS for elderly patients.
2
Society of Hospital Medicine (U.S.), Mourad, M., et al (2011). Patient Satisfaction with a Hospitalist Procedure Service:
Is Bedside Procedure Teaching Reassuring to Patients?
6. 6
The provider experience – more
face time, less administration
For hospitals, clinicians and other care
providers, the Connected Patient could
not lead to more meaningful results:
improved patient outcomes, reduced
costs, reduced liability, and enhanced
community standing.
So much time is currently lost to walking
between nurse stations to retrieve
incomplete information, or waiting for
results. Attempts to reach colleagues
for consultation are often unsuccessful
because that colleague is engaged
elsewhere, so messages are left in voice
mail. A specialist is off-site, so on-duty
staff delay a complex procedure for want
of a consultation. Meanwhile, the clock
moves forward.
We can help you recover time and effort
to streamline processes to produce better,
more effective patient care.
Collaborate now
Unified communications mean healthcare
teams can collaborate – rapidly,
completely, and on the first attempt.
Through “presence”, care team members’
availability for a conference is visible on
the user interface before a call attempt
is made, providing the opportunity to
reach out to alternate team members
first. A single click instantly connects the
team on whatever devices they’re using
at the time, without needing to know the
number or have them dial a conference
bridge. Video-enabled Web collaboration
helps them review and jointly update
plan-of-care documents, or dynamically
whiteboard a complex thought. Voice
messages can be read as emails, and
emails listened to as voice messages. And
all of it mobile, so care happens wherever
you are.
Ultimately, this means patients get treated
faster, and staff has more time with
patients.
Everything you need, where you need it
Point-of-care solutions – which can be
integrated with UC – have two direct
and profound implications for your care
staff. First, through integrating with the
hospital’s EMR system, team members can
be assured that a patient’s full, current
records are at the bedside. Lab results and
imaging are available at the bedside the
moment they’re released. If the patient
is moved from one ward to another, the
full record moves along with them, and
everyone who needs to know, knows, from
the pharmacy to the switchboard. Perhaps
more significantly, though, clinicians and
nurses are able to update records in real
time while they’re fresh in mind, without
the risk of small but crucial details
being forgotten later. This could have a
significantly positive impact on correct
treatment, and on liability.
4
Luras, et al (2007). Long term care and Hospital LoS for elderly patients.
7. A hand on the pulse of patient
satisfaction
Contact centers have been pressed into
service for decades on behalf of better
customer service – just about everywhere
except healthcare. But as healthcare
becomes more consumerized, with
more competitive options available to
discriminating patients, differentiating
your offering becomes critical to growth.
And contact centers provide providers
with a host of options to enhance
awareness with your patient-customers.
For patients, family members, and friends,
callers can direct themselves quickly to
scheduling, admissions, billing, follow
up – without tying up scarce human
resources on routine tasks. Intelligent
routing makes sure detailed inquiries
get to the right department, significantly
improving the likelihood of resolution
on the first attempt – a prime indicator of
customer satisfaction.
Post care, outbound campaign capabilities
can push surveys as well as automated
medication and appointment reminders.
The patient gets the information they’re
looking for in a timely manner, liability
risks are contained, and patient-customer
satisfaction is enhanced.
To make sure you leverage these
technology and human resources
to the fullest extent, Unify provides
sophisticated workforce optimization
solutions to monitor and analyze
performance and compliance. These
help ensure your continually improve
your patient engagement and increase
productivity.
7
8. 8
Keeping ahead of schedules, getting
the word out
As discussed with patient benefits,
Unify’s integrated response solution helps
providers stay ahead of missed or lagging
appointments, while assisting patients
in keeping up with medication and
treatment regimens. And for emergency
response / business continuity plans,
combining alarm response with our high-
volume dispatch solution means even
extremely large and diverse stakeholder
teams can be assembled instantly.
Lastly, these Connected Patient tools can
be deployed as best suits your business
model –on-premises, in the cloud, or as
a hybrid. So we flex to you, rather than
demanding you bend to us. And Unify can
not only design, implement, and maintain
all this, but manage it so you can keep
your scarce and valuable IT staff on more
mission-critical projects.
So, the connected patient results in better
patient care faster, with greater team
awareness, and reduced liability
and costs.
9. Conclusion
The connected patient results in better
patient care delivered faster, with more
and auditable control, with greater
team awareness, and yielding reduced
liability and costs. It opens the door to
an elusive but valuable new paradigm:
everything everyone needs to know the
moment it’s needed. Through Unify’s
Connected Patient portfolio of unified
communications, point-of-care, alarm
response, dispatch, command and control,
and contact center solutions, you can
provide patients a more high-touch,
personalized care experience while
helping them engage more completely
in that care and its follow up. Providers
benefit from vastly enhanced, richer,
and simpler collaboration, and more
qualitative documentation.
The Connected Patient concept is real,
with solutions deliverable today. Unify
has worked with providers globally to
deliver world-class healthcare solutions
in over 15,000 implementations. As a
recognized visionary and market leader
by global experts such as Gartner3
,
Forrester4
, and others, and with over
fifty years’ experience in healthcare
communications, you can be assured of
partnering with someone who knows you,
and understands your patients’ needs.
Talk with your Unify representative to
learn more.
It’s a new way to work.
Solution index
Unified communications – A software
platform for unified, comprehensive
communications applications, including
voice, audio, and video conferencing,
online collaboration, messaging, and
contact center.
• OpenScape UC Application
• OpenScape Voice
• OpenScape 4000 (current customers)
Point-of-care bedside terminals –
Interactive, multi-function bedside
workstations for both patients and
clinicians, providing infotainment,
communications, and EMR/hospital
systems integration.
• OpenScape Health Station (US and UK)5
• OpenScape Health Station
(Rest of world)5
Alarm response – Mobile client-optimized
server to simultaneously or sequentially
alert and inform first responders via
phone or text messaging in virtually
any scenario.
• OpenScape Alarm Response
Dispatch / Command and control –
Secure, extremely high-capacity, high-
availability multi-line communications
solution for dispatchers in time-critical,
high pressure dispatch environments
• OpenScape Xpert
Contact center – Comprehensive scalable
customer service solutions, including
inbound contact center, interactive voice
response (IVR), outbound / campaign
management, and workforce optimization
(WFO), for premise-based, private cloud,
public cloud, and hybrid implementations.
• OpenScape Contact Center Suite
Learn more about The New Way to Work
at http://www.unify.com/us/new-way-to-
work.aspx
9
3
2013 Gartner Critical Capabilities for Unified Communications.
4
The Forrester Wave™: On-Premises Unified Communications And Collaboration, Q2 2014.
5
Specific Health Station solutions vary by country due to regulatory or compliance differences.
