Using Innovation to Improve Care

Using Innovation to Improve Care

As a 92-bed full-service, not-for-profit regional hospital with only 120 active and consulting physicians serving a rural community, healthcare innovations help overcome the challenges of delivering quality care to the approximately 30,000 people, of which over 60 percent are aged and retired, with multiple healthcare needs. This article presents an analysis report of two innovative healthcare services, Virtual Sitter Service and Tele-Wound Consulting Service, under consideration for purchase, focusing on how each innovation aligns with the organization’s mission and philosophy in service delivery in rural and suburban settings.

Virtual Sitter Service and Tele-Wound Consulting Service Analysis

The Virtual Sitter Service is an innovative solution that will allow healthcare professionals to remotely monitor and provide virtual assistance to the rural community. The Virtual Sitter Service will eliminate the need for physical sitters among patients under observation and care. This will allow qualified physicians and nurses to monitor and provide virtual assistance to multiple patients simultaneously. On the other hand, the Tele-Wound Consulting Service will allow the care providers to provide remote real-time wound and injury-related consultative services to the patients regardless of the location. The Tele-Wound Consulting Service also allows the organization to coordinate with other specialized wound care providers outside the region of service to improve the efficiency of remote wound care.

In this case, the recommended first choice innovation is the Tele-Wound Consulting Service. As a rural hospital serving a community of majorly elderly residents with a high prevalence of diabetes, heart disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases, the risk of falls and injuries resulting in wounds is common. Elderly adults in rural areas are exposed to multiple fall risk factors, resulting in an estimated 30 percent fall prevalence rate (Zhang et al., 2022). Due to the exposure to multiple risk factors, injuries and wounds are more prevalent among rural residents as compared to urban settings (Bang et al., 2019). This creates a demand for wound-related consultation, which may strain the available capital and human resources. Telehealth services such as tele-wound services are moted to improve efficiency in service delivery with positive patient and provider outcomes (Gajarawala & Pelkowski, 2021).

Immediate Impacts

Immediate Impacts to Healthcare of the Community Served

As the Tele-Wound Consulting Service, as with other telehealth services, eliminate the need to travel and improve the efficiency and accessibility of care services (Hasselfield, 2022), it will eliminate the need for traveling for wound management consultations with immediate impacts on the costs of care for wounds associated with traveling as well as better wound care outcomes as services are easily accessible.

Immediate Impacts on the Healthcare Organization

The Tele-Wound Consulting Service will also reduce the operating costs of providing wound consultation services as one physician will be able to serve multiple patients at a time, which is the benefit of implementing telehealth (Hasselfield, 2022). It will also improve the responsiveness of the hospital to emergency injury and wound cases as the need for traveling will be eliminated.

Projected Impacts

Projected Impacts on Healthcare of the Community Served

Tele-Wound Consulting Service is projected to help with equitable healthcare access and outcomes in wound care as many will be able to access wound and other care services at a reduced cost. Additionally, telehealth services in rural areas have been associated with improved patient satisfaction in the long term (Harkey et al., 2020).

Projected Impacts on the Healthcare Organization

With improved efficiency and reduced costs associated with the Tele-Wound Consulting Service, it is projected to improve the long-term sustainability of wound care services provided by the organization. Additionally, as evidenced by the improved ability to deliver care to underserved regions with the use of telehealthcare services (Salgado et al., 2021), the Tele-Wound Consulting Service will enable the hospital to live up to its mission and philosophy.

References

Bang, F., McFaull, S., Cheesman, J., & Do, M. T. (2019). The rural-urban gap: Differences in injury characteristics. Health Promotion and Chronic Disease Prevention in Canada, 39(12). https://doi.org/10.24095/hpcdp.39.12.01

Gajarawala, S. N., & Pelkowski, J. N. (2021). Telehealth Benefits and Barriers. The Journal for Nurse Practitioners, 17(2), 218–221. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.NURPRA.2020.09.013

Harkey, L. C., Jung, S. M., Newton, E. R., & Patterson, A. (2020). Patient Satisfaction with Telehealth in Rural Settings: A Systematic Review. International Journal of Telerehabilitation, 12(2), 53. https://doi.org/10.5195/IJT.2020.6303

Hasselfield, W. B. (2022). Benefits of Telemedicine. Johns Hopkins Medicine. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/treatment-tests-and-therapies/benefits-of-

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Competency
Analyze an innovation that led to a redesigned process or product.

Student Success Criteria
View the grading rubric for this deliverable by selecting the “This item is graded with a rubric” link, which is located in the Details & Information pane.

Scenario
After recently graduating with a Bachelor of Science (BSN) in Nursing, you were promoted to Clinical Educator for your unit. The nurse manager asked for your help in completing an innovative practice analysis to assist the organization with determining future needs for technology to lead innovation and future service for the local community. The title for this renewed drive for innovation in practice excellence is named, “Time for the Future is Now.”

Organizational characteristics:

92-bed full-service, not-for-profit regional hospital
600 employees, 120 of which are active and consulting physicians
The mission is simple: improve the health, lives, and well-being of the people in the community we serve.
Philosophy: we service a rural community as if we were in a suburban setting.
Unique services currently offered include:

A team approach to cancer care with an on-site multidisciplinary clinical rounding served by virtual assistants.
On-site Adult Care with a focus on Adult Day Care and Overnight Respite (currently the largest cost center).
Genetics Counseling features a personalized approach to drug therapies provided via virtual visits by doctors, masters-prepared nurse genetic counselors, and 24-hour access to the side-effect and drug effectiveness monitoring with a password-protected laboratory portal.
Virtual Primary Care offered from 7am-11pm with a fee of $25.00 per visit for routine health services.