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Inter-hospital Patient Transfer System

We are studying how patients are transferred between hospitals. The project involves user studies, observations, process modeling, analysis and simulation. We are working with Banner, a large non-profit health organization.

Hand Hygiene Monitoring & Compliance

In collaboration with Northern Arizona Healthcare and Flagstaff Medical Centre, we have developed a novel hand sanitization monitoring system. The key advantage of this system is its ability to integrate with any existing sanitization stand, and can seamlessly monitor sanitization practices. The system does not require hospital staff to carry any additional devices. Instead, the system utilizes staff phones to monitor the practice.

Observations and Analysis of Heart Patients Process

Hospitals must improve patient flow to achieve better efficiency and improve patients’ outcomes. Recent advancements in real time monitoring have provided immediate feedback for clinicians to address any bottlenecks. However, root causes of delays remain embedded in the details of clinicians’ activities. This work presents an observational study of a clinical pathway within a heart unit at a community hospital in North America. Observational data is correlated with multiple sources to uncover flow patterns. We observe heart patients as they arrive in at the heart unit and throughout their care up until their discharge. Data is correlated with electronic healthcare records and paper trails to enhance data reliability and accuracy. We find that single data source alone is not sufficient to uncover process patterns. In our study, we discovered a negative correlation between the number of patients arriving at the hospital, and the total wait time each patient has experienced. We also identified key inefficiencies in the first and last hours of work shifts.

Omar Badreddin, Ricardo Castillo. “Patient Flow Management: Combining Analytical and Observational Data to Uncover Flow Patterns“. In HealthInf proceedings of the 2015 International Conference on Health Informatics.

Administering Time Critical Care for Heart Patients

 

Patient Flow Simulations and Process Re-engineering

 

Management of Anti-biotic Resistant Infections

 

Fine-Grained Monitoring of Patients and Staff Flow

 

Process Engineering for Lung and Colon Cancer Patients