The Key-Whitman Eye Center, a Texas ophthalmic services provider with clinics in Dallas, Arlington and Plano, prides itself in providing cutting-edge medical services using the latest technologies (such as LASIK laser eye surgery). The reputation it has earned, however, has also led to some very traditional problems—namely, long waits for patients arriving at its two largest clinics for examinations, tests and surgical procedures.
A real-time location system (RTLS) provided by Versus Technology, using infrared (IR) and radio frequency identification technologies, is expected to solve the problem, says Dan Chambers, Key-Whitman’s chief administrative officer. By tracking the movements of patients, staff members and doctors throughout the facility, the eye center hopes to gain a better understanding of where and for how long patients remain at one or more locations, as well as the amount of time they spend with care providers. This information will not only enable the staff to address problems in real time (such as a patient spending an excessive amount of time alone waiting for services), but also provide valuable information for business analysis at the end of the day, week or month.
Key-Whitman plans to take the Versus Advantages Clinic Module system live next month—first at the Dallas clinic, where between 120 and 140 patients are seen daily, and shortly thereafter at the Plano clinic, where as many as 100 patients visit each day. The third clinic, located in Arlington, is smaller and thus would not benefit from the technology, the company reports.
By nature, Chambers says, the procedures and patient flow at the two larger clinics are constantly changing, since visits and services vary considerably. The Dallas clinic provides surgical procedures, as well as examinations and other basic eye-care services, and a patient’s visit can often last hours as that person moves from one area (where, for example, he or she might receive eyedrops to dilate the irises) to another (such as an examining room). If unexpected testing is deemed necessary based on an exam’s results, the patient will then be moved into yet another area of the 20,000-square-foot clinic. For some patients, this can mean spending several hours within the center, and enduring long waits in the waiting room.
No surgical procedures take place at the Plano Clinic, and movement during visits can thus be simpler. However, the sheer quantity of patients at the 5,000-square-foot facility can lead to long waits as well.
Chambers’ mission has been to reduce those wait times at both clinics, and to move patients more quickly throughout their visit. Key-Whitman acquired a Simcad software solution from CreateASoft that helps the company simulate each clinic’s layout and then update the design as patient flow needs change. However, inputting the required data (such as how long patients spent at which locations, and when this occurred) was still a laborious task.
Key-Whitman looked into using electronic medical records with time stamps to track patient visits, but the resulting data was often incorrect, requiring the staff to manually key in the times at which each patient was examined. “We had a conundrum in front of us,” Chambers states. “The time stamps weren’t consistently reflective of real-time processes.” What’s more, he says, even if workers were able to input the time stamps, most of the time “they could be off by 20 to 30 percent, and that variable is too great” to provide the necessary accuracy level.
“We needed a mechanism to track patients, staff and doctors passively,” Chambers says, which is why Key-Whitman is installing Versus Technology’s RTLS solution. The system, known as Versus Advantages, includes IR-RFID tags embedded in badges worn by patients, staff members and doctors, along with tag readers (which Versus calls sensors) installed throughout the facility to capture the badges’ IR and RF transmissions. Location data is managed by Versus Advantages software residing on the Key-Whitman Eye Center’s database, and is forwarded to the Simcad software.
With the system in place, employees will arrive for a shift each day and acquire a Versus ClearView badge encoded with a unique ID number linked to that person’s work title, such as clinician. Doctors, on the other hand, are assigned a badge containing an ID linked in the software to that individual’s identity. Upon arriving for a visit, a patient is provided with his or her own badge to wear throughout the visit.
At each clinic, 102 Versus sensors will be installed on ceilings, in order to provide room-level location data, explains Lou Ann Hinton, Versus Technology’s national sales director. Within some of the larger rooms, multiple sensors will enable the system to detect in which part of the room a particular patient is located. Every three seconds, the Versus ClearView badge transmits IR and RF signals encoded with its unique ID number. When a sensor receives such a signal, it emits a return transmission encoded with the sensor’s location ID number—linked to a room (for example, Exam Room 102)—to the badge, via a 2.4 GHz RFID signal. The badge then transmits its own ID and the sensor’s location ID (for example, Patient Smith, Exam Room 102) via RF 2.4 GHz to an RFID reader, known as the Link.
The Link, plugged into a regular wall outlet, sends the entire information packet to a Versus gateway via 2.4 GHz. If an individual requires immediate assistance, he or she can press a button on the badge, and that alert indication will then be forwarded to the Link reader via RFID only. The gateway that receives data from the Link is plugged into the back-end system where Versus software resides.
The software will help Key-Whitman identify how long a patient remains in any area within either of the two clinics, as well as when that patient receives visits by staff members and doctors, and for how long. If the preset system parameters determine that an individual has been waiting for too long, an alert can be displayed in the software, or a message can be sent to workers via text message or e-mail.
In addition, Chambers says, data culled from the Versus system will help him better plan any procedural changes, optimize patient flow and perform scheduling adjustments. “I do expect to increase productivity,” he states. “So if I can increase capacity by 5 percent, then I can get a very positive ROI.”
His ultimate goal, Chambers says, is to reduce patient wait times down to zero to 20 minutes, and to reduce patient cycle times. “Those are my A-number-one goals,” he reports, noting that having patients who are happier with their visit can lead to a happier staff, in addition to an overall positive environment.
“Key-Whitman is going to change the way ophthalmologists do business,” Hinton says.