MKM Health’s patient safety implementation specialist returns from UK with wealth of knowledge
With this initiative there have been a large number of NHS Trusts who now have approved funding to implement new patient safety systems. To assist with this increased demand MKM Health’s senior consultant Cindy Wills, travelled to the UK for 11 month to support our partner solution - Patientrack.
While in the UK, Cindy led the implementation of Patientrack at both Stockport and Derby NHS Foundation Trusts, as well as assisting other Patientrack sites with version upgrades and general support. She was also given the opportunity to learn a large amount about different patient safety areas by helping in the development of a number of assessments in the areas of sepsis identification, fluid management, diabetes management and IV line infection control. She also was able to attend numerous patient safety conferences including the International Forum on Quality & Safety in Healthcare where she learnt about the current state of patient safety and how IT solutions could contribute to mitigating some of these risks.
From her time abroad Cindy has found that, every hospital has different policies from patient safety through to IT robustness. She has developed a deep understanding how important it is for hospitals to have systems that are able to support these variations as well as allocating the time to assess these in projects. She also discovered in some instances, policies were not strictly adhered to and introducing a system that better enforces these policies; not only highlights instances of non-compliance but directly impacts positively on patient outcomes.
Now back in Australia, Cindy says that she is looking forward to using all the experience and knowledge gained in the UK to help Australian and New Zealand hospitals achieve their targets in preventing patient deterioration and adverse events. “Improving patient safety is a real passion of mine and I’m eager to see our hospitals implement innovative solutions such as Patientrack”.
About Cindy Wills:
Cindy started working in the IT industry in 2009 with a specialisation in health and patient safety. She has worked as a project manager, senior consultant, business analyst and software trainer. During this time she has been involved in projects to develop and implement software focused on preventing patient deterioration as well as business intelligence systems to detect fraud.
About Patientrack:
Patientrack helps hospitals deliver safer care – which is also more cost-effective care – by ensuring observation and assessment protocols are carried out correctly and consistently, and by automatically calculating early warning scores and alerting clinicians when interventions are needed. Through early identification of deteriorating patients, Patientrack helps hospitals meet national and local targets for improvements in patient safety, while cutting costs through reducing lengths of stay and transfers to ICU within the hospital. Patientrack was developed in conjunction with clinicians and nurses and its effectiveness in delivering both patient safety and cost improvements has been proven in a peer-reviewed clinical trial.