Home Care Leaders
Share Experiences, Process Improvements at
PtCT's National User Conference
Home care has
certainly changed since 1880, when volunteers
in Albany, NY first formed the Fruit and
Flower Mission, to deliver fruit and flowers
to the sick. Since then, caring for the ill
and infirmed outside of the hospital setting
has evolved from a grassroots charity to a
nationwide business—particularly
following the creation of the Medicaid and
Medicare programs in the 1960s. The
complications of providing cost-efficient and
quality home care in this increasingly
complicated industry were among the main
topics of discussion during the recent
Patient Care Technologies, Inc. (PtCT)
National User Conference, which brought
together dozens of organizations from across
the U.S.
The
event's Keynote Speaker was Stephen Tweed,
CEO of Leading Home Care, who addressed how a
rapid pattern of growth and change compels
today's agencies to streamline their current
processes with technology, in order to stay
competitive. Several event speakers led
discussions on how today's agencies can grow
prosperous organizations by streamlining both
clinical and business processes with I.T.
Many of them detailed how PtCT's Maestro
product, a process driven system built to
improve workflow and provide useable data for
reporting, can help facilities to reach their
goals, even in challenging economic times.
One
organization reaping benefits through
embracing change is St. Cloud Hospital Home
Care and Hospice (St. Cloud, MN), which took
a hard look at its care processes prior to
its implementation of Maestro. St. Cloud
welcomed a task-based integrated system to
keep the clinicians accountable and guide
their workflow during the day. And by
evaluating current practices before
implementation and being prepared to make
changes where necessary after go-LIVE, St.
Cloud set the stage for automated, safer
procedures for each clinician using the
system.
With
their implementation of Maestro Hospice,
another customer, Partners in Home Care, Inc.
(Missoula, MT) shared experiences similar to
St. Cloud, where "getting the house in
order" with best practices proved to be
a beneficial undertaking prior to software
implementation. Using a system tailored to
its preferences, Partners established new
daily routines which made its staff more
organized and structured during patient
visits. Similarly to St. Cloud, Partners
recommends taking time to establish Core
Teams and Core Clinical Teams to create new
routines, build dictionaries, and serve as
resources for the rest of the staff.
Union
Home Health Care (Dover, OH) is another
customer which has found success with Maestro,
particularly in the area of creating reports
to measure their quality progress. By using
actionable data within the Maestro system,
the site has been able to improve care
processes based on a history of outcomes.
Union praised Maestro's "easy-to-use"
Report Wizard, which created many of its user-specific
and benchmarking reports.
In
addition to the customer speakers,
representatives from PtCT also took the stage
to provide attendees with information
regarding system enhancements and new
development initiatives. Several staff
members also led smaller breakout sessions,
allowing audience members to share their
questions and experiences, as well as give
direct feedback on the company's direction.
Presentations
from PtCT's National User Conference are now
available on www.ptct.com.