InnerWireless Expands Installation at University of Chicago
The University of Chicago Hospitals and Health Systems is going to install the InnerWireless wireless infrastructure in their adult acute care hospital the Bernard A. Mitchell Hospital. You may recall that last year the University of Chicago installed InnerWireless in their new Comer Children's Hospital. Extending the infrastructure to an existing hospital seems a real commitment to the technology (more here and here).
well InnerWireless performed in our pediatric hospital, we decided that the
wireless utility infrastructure was the best way to deliver wireless service
capabilities to caregivers throughout our healthcare system,” Yablonka said.
“In addition to the children’s hospital and our adult inpatient facility, we
plan to deploy the Wireless Utility at our outpatient care facility, the Duchossois Center for Advanced
Medicine. Having one unified wireless distribution platform is the answer for
The University of Chicago Hospitals and Health
System.”
This is a great example of the trend to take fragmented point solutions and through the application of new technology, create an enterprise solution that is more reliable, has a lower cost of ownership (TCO) and is easier to manage. We'll be seeing this trend in other medical market segments in the future.
Blog Survey Results
Last fall I was asked to participate in the Edelman/Technorati blog survey of business bloggers. The idea was to better understand bloggers' attitudes towards corporations and PR firms. The results were intended to help Richard Edelman advise his clients about the blogosphere and possibly creating their own corporate blogs. You can view the results here.
The primary reason that respondents blogged was to establish credibility and gain visibility, closely followed by creating a record of thoughts, and connecting with others. Most blog every few days or daily. The vast majority would like to receive product samples from companies in order to evaluate products on their blog – I certainly fall into this category. I would love to try out that new GE LightSpeed VCT; but I'll pass on getting “chipped.”
Almost 50% of bloggers are never contacted by companies or their PR minions, and that's a shame. A few vendors have contacted me, usually resulting in a post. These vendor contacts come in handy when helping clients too. There's also a bunch of survey questions about trustworthiness and how blog entries are corrected.
Medication Errors Highest in Radiology
Medication errors that harm patients are seven times more frequent in
the course of radiological services than in other hospital settings,
according to the analysis by the United States Pharmacopeia. (Press release)
2000 to 2004, 12 percent of the 2,032 medication errors reported in
radiological services resulted in patient harm. This is more than seven
times the percentage of harmful errors reported in the 2000–2004
general MEDMARX data set. Radiological services were also more likely
to result in the need for additional care and consumption of resources.
outpatient radiological services include the radiology department,
cardiac catheterization laboratory, and nuclear medicine. These
services involve an increasing number of procedures and tests each
year, despite the common misperception that radiology is limited to
x-rays. In addition to diagnostic exams, radiological services include
procedures such as draining abscesses, inserting gastric feeding tubes,
inserting arterial stents, and performing angioplasties.
departments. Of those, 12 percent resulted in some kind of harm to
patients, which is seven times higher than the percentage of hospital
medication errors that caused harm overall.
It is interesting to note that patient transfers between nursing units also impacts patient safety, for the many of the same reasons: communications and familiarity with the patient.
[Hat tip: FierceHealthcare]
VISICU Licenses Tech to Advanced ICU Care
VISICU has licensed their eICU system to Advanced ICU Care who will target smaller community hospitals. VISICU's traditional target market has been large hospitals and delivery systems.
system to enter into a licensing agreement with VISICU. This
arrangement will enable Advanced ICU Care to provide on-site
intensivist coverage coupled with this new critical care model.
VISICU (be sure to mute your speakers before you load their home page) currently monitors over 1,000 ICU beds at customer sites.
Hospitals Provide Wireless Internet Access to Patients
There was some discussion recently on the Biomed Listserv from some folks at hospitals considering making wireless Internet access available to patients. So, today's iHealthBeat story about some hospitals in Akron offering this service caught my eye.
To alleviate security concerns, the hospital opted to use a separate
Internet feed it had available for public access, she said. Only
authorized staff can get through two firewalls to access the highly
secure Internet line containing patient information.
At WRH Health System, only staff who have a special encryption
loaded onto their laptops or personal data assistants (pdas) can access
the encrypted wireless network that contains patient records, Sauer
said.
“We do not broadcast it,'' he said. “You would not see the private network.''
Both hospitals also use filters to block inappropriate sites.
The American Hospital Association doesn't track the number of health
care facilities that offer wireless Internet access to patients. But a
spokeswoman said the association has heard from members that this is a
growing trend.
You can see past stories on this trend here, and here. Vendors like Bluesocket provide network appliances to provide what's called “guest access.”
UPDATE: In a comment below, reader John recommends vendor Perfigo for network admission control, since acquired by Cisco.
