Bupa Cromwell Hospital has moved a step closer to achieving its strategy to become paper-light by partnering with IMS MAXIMS to extend the roll-out of an electronic patient record.
Within a few months of signing the agreement, the hospital will deploy the company’s electronic order communications and results reporting (OCS & RR) that will introduce new processes to improve the accessibility of medical tests.
As part of the private hospital’s ongoing investment programme into its estate and infrastructure, it will be using MAXIMS OCS & RR to digitise the way in which clinicians manage diagnostic tests, starting with radiology and pathology services. Staff will be able to order and view results instantly and eliminate the delays, bottlenecks and errors associated with paper-based systems that rely on manual interventions.
Supporting the hospital’s best of breed approach to digital, MAXIMS will integrate with the existing patient administration system (PAS) and diagnostic systems, giving clinical staff access to results when they are on and off-site, at any time. Clinicians can be confident that the order has been sent to the right person without the risk of transcription errors, and can track its progress within the patient’s health record.
Opting for the IMS MAXIMS digital transformation package that offers deployment support, Bupa Cromwell Hospital will adopt the technology provider’s clinically-led business process change model and deploy the company’s implementation team. Key activities such as configuring the product for the hospital’s needs, defining new business processes, developing data and management reports, and training staff will be led by IMS MAXIMS. Cromwell won’t have to find, fund or train additional internal resources, but the IMS MAXIMS team will work closely with the hospital’s consultants to meet the needs of clinicians and their patients.
Paul Cowley, IT Director, Bupa Health Services, said, “The roll-out of order comms and results reporting is the natural next step for us to extend our digitised record towards a fully integrated EPR across the hospital.
“We have ambitious plans for using digital to reconfigure and improve our services, and to achieve them in our timescales, we wanted a partner that could integrate into our team and provide support from concept through to deployment. It’s why we opted for the MAXIMS transformation package.”
The OCS & RR software will be deployed on a Software as a Service basis to help reduce overall running costs and overheads for the hospital. It will also give staff the added flexibility to change and adapt the software as the hospital’s digital strategy evolves, without making significant changes to the estate.
Preparations for implementation have commenced and the go-live is expected in Spring 2018, with discussions about further deployment and additional functionality planned for later in the year.
Leesa Ewing, Commercial Director, IMS MAXIMS, said, “To be able to respond to the growing needs and expectations of patients today it’s important to modernise services, and technology offers a way to do this quickly and effectively. Bupa Cromwell Hospital clearly understands this; by introducing an electronic OCS & RR system to an expanding portfolio of software solutions, it is laying the foundations for a world-class, digitally enabled hospital.
“We’re therefore excited to be working with Bupa, which joins our growing family of private healthcare customers, and we hope it paves the way for a longer-term relationship in realising the hospital’s paper-light intentions.”
