Health and Wellness Informatics News
UCHealth is opting for new telehealth technologies in deteriorating cases. The delays and lack of efficiency by manual caretakers are now reduced with Virtual Deterioration. Caretakers and support groups can monitor the patient virtually and act faster than before.
UCHealth is a group of 12 hospitals in Colorado spread across the state. The organization has now launched its new virtual take-care program. They call it the Virtual Deterioration program. With the program, they are trying to find deteriorating patients sooner and faster. The goal is to detect and rescue them for appropriate treatment hence better outcomes.
The problem before the program was that there were a lot of variables in the process. These variables lead to unintentional delay and failure in treatments, says Dr. Diana Breyer. Thus we need the help of telehealth technologies to monitor the patient’s vital signs without human interference.
For the same, UCHealth started using vendor AvaSure’s TeleSitter platform for virtual ICU verifications. This elaborates on the technologies used for Virtual Deterioration.
Before the technology, the process involved the clinic staff along with a command center on the frontline. The process involved a lot of friction between the bedside staff and the patients. It was also difficult for the command center to monitor and examine the patients. The process was hectic and required a lot more time.
So, they attached a camera to the medical card for video checkups. Now the command center can easily monitor the patients. It helps in diagnosing deterioration in the early stages and helps to prevent the worse outcomes, says Amy Hassell, director UCHealth.
Now Virtual Deterioration is an independent technology at UCHealth. The caretakers can visit the portal and view patients one by one from the chart. The monitoring system is in the hands of the clinicians. At the same time, the staff in the command room can be intact with the patient through the screen.
These telehealth technologies reduced the code blues from 25 to 70%. The program is showing positive repose from both workers and patients as well.
