Comment

Comment by Dean Karavite on July 26, 2009 at 10:21am

Hey Bryce, "dated technology stuff" just shows you were way ahead of the game! :-) I think you raise a super important topic. I believe that the entire field of healthcare is quite open to collaboration and information sharing, they just haven't been given the time or tools.

Though not quite the same thing we were early adopters in a multi hospital collaborative to measure operating room efficiency. Please realize that the OR is almost always a hospitals largest cost and revenue center, therefore OR efficiency is critical to controlling costs (Emergency Department is often next on the list). There really aren't standards for many of the metrics hospitals use to measure OR efficiency, so having a group of 200+ hospitals to compare data with was fantastic (I think it is over a thousand now and the entire country of Canada is using it as well).

The collaborative allowed each hospital to submit data (no matter what system was used) on a monthly basis. The data was compiled and available to view via web based BI and data visualization tools. These tools were easy to use and versatile and as a result users were discovering new types of analysis all the time. Unlike business, hospitals (at least those not in the same city) are very open to sharing information and ideas. Members of the collaborative would freely share ideas, success stories and areas of continuing challenges. In addition, the group formed user groups and was very open and responsive to continual interaction design improvements.

It's rather surprising that so few of these types of data collaboratives exist. While everyone works toward a paperless patient chart, how about a paperless hospital conference room? Hospitals everywhere are absolutely consumed with running report after report after report on almost every aspect of operations and yet struggle to truly understand, "How are we doing?" and "How can we do better?"

Here is a link to the OR Benchmarks Collaborative: http://sites.mckesson.com/orbc/

Comment by Peter Jones on July 21, 2009 at 10:33am

Thanks Bryce - It is really helpful to get an example with screenshots up on the site. For those who are working with internal / staff portals, what else have you been doing along these lines?

It looks like the portal design was driven by administrative needs primarily, and then Labs are included. Would Labs be duplicated in the EMR, once they set one up? What are the drivers or factors for sharing knowledge within an institution versus with a physician community, as in Sermo? Did they see using this system for collaborative care plans or patient case documentation?