Tiroler Landeskrankenanstalten
Ring binders have had their days in the hospitals of Tirol.
An electronic office information system has taken over from its
paper-based predecessor and is now optimizing workflows in administration
and quality management.
Document and Quality Management
Over a hundred thousand people a year are treated as in-patients at the hospitals run by Tiroler Landeskrankenanstalten GmbH (TILAK) in Tirol, Austria. TILAK, a healthcare company, oversees Innsbruck‘s University Hospital and three further hospitals in Natters, Hochzirl and Hall. As such, it is both the leading medical care provider and one of the biggest employers in western Austria.
With budgets growing ever tighter in the healthcare sector, low-cost, efficient administration helps ensure that patients continue to receive optimal care. An electronic office information system simplifies the organization of files and records, giving administrative units more flexible ways to control both documents and the versioning process. The core of this solution is a powerful content and document management platform.
Quality management based on a Hyperwave solution
Cost efficiency is clearly an imperative. Yet quality of service is equally crucial to the modern healthcare industry. TILAK was thus quick to understand that quality management is a job for the top management and placed responsibility firmly with the company‘s executive board. One of the key tools to ensure verifiable standards of performance – and, increasingly, the yardstick by which the provision of medical care in hospitals is measured – is the ISO accreditation of clinical and diagnostic departments, such as the central laboratory, pharmacy, blood bank and the radiology unit.
Quality assurance in relation to ISO standards and in the context of the GMP and GLP standards for production and laboratory processes does not stop when a specialist department or administrative unit earns a certificate, however. Defined workflows and processes help ensure that departments consistently maintain high standards in the long run.
To this end, Hyperwave worked together with TILAK‘s Quality Management and Information Management units to formulate a tailor-made quality system that dovetails seamlessly with the content management platform. The centerpiece of this solution is an error management system for the ISO-accredited specialist departments.
Based on a defined workflow that uses preset form templates, errors and problems can be documented in a clearly structured manner. Quality managers and process owners are notified automatically and, thanks to the trouble tickets supplied, can take appropriate action and monitor implementation. These standard functions can be custom-tailored to each department‘s individual quality processes. Workflow templates can likewise be adapted to their specific error management needs.
In an initial pilot phase, the 35 people who staff the organization‘s central pharmacy kicked the tires of the new quality solution. Their feedback was carefully analyzed, and the changes they suggested were implemented immediately. That paved the way for the error management system to be introduced in further specialist departments too. Although the system was originally developed only for TILAK, other Austrian hospitals are already showing an interest in the solution.
Clearing out the filing cabinets, digitizing the data
Until recently, most of TILAK‘s administrative work was recorded on paper. All kinds of documents were stashed away in filing cabinets and archives at the company‘s various sites. Whenever someone needed a specific document, they had to go hunting for it. That wasted previous work time. Not even electronic documents were available to everyone from everywhere. The only way to really make sure everyone in a team was constantly up to speed was to disseminate files as e mail attachments and then ensure that the latest versions were always stored properly on file servers.
To simplify collaboration between secretarial units and project teams based at different locations, TILAK decided to introduce an electronic document management system from end to end. While maintaining the existing organization of the filing system, the paper files from more than 20 different departments were to be digitized. The aim in future was to be able to manage and archive all this data electronically from start to finish.
From prototype to productive e office
After sifting through 15 different products, TILAK supplied seven providers with a detailed set of specifications and asked them to hammer out a prototype version of the new office management and information platform in very fast time. The Hyperwave solution combined an intuitive, user-friendly interface with powerful document search and retrieval functions and deep integration in existing office applications. TILAK liked what it saw.
On a more technical level, the content and document management platform is extremely scalable and comprises a broad spectrum of solutions, such as workflow and workgroup functionality. Moreover, support for standard programming languages such as JavaScript and XML, plus the availability of interfaces such as LDAP, meant that subsequent customized add-ons are not bound to proprietary technology.
Analysis data, reports and all kinds of shared documents can be accessed quickly at any time with the Hyperwave solution. The high-performance integrated Verity search engine lets us track down all information very fast and then display it in the built-in viewer. By and large, we can now do without the practice of disseminating copies of documents as attachments to e mail circulars. That will save us time and speed up collaboration. Dr. Dietmar Reiter, head of special-purpose IT systems
Impressed by the prototype, TILAK decided to install the Hyperwave platform and the Hyperwave eKnowledge suite. Staff of the IT department were the first people to use the new office information system for their project management assignments. Software specifications, guidelines, reference data and other vital documents can now be managed reliably with uniform versioning control.
Workflow option and other add-ons
One goal was to eliminate as much paper as possible from administrative workflows, using an electronic information system to simplify these processes. Thanks to the new office system, Tirol‘s hospitals now experience the added benefit that many communication and documentation tasks can be completed within a single, central system. Hyperwave‘s Workflow Option models document flows for key administrative activities that transcend the boundaries of individual organizational units.
The Hyperwave Explorer then guarantees fast, easy access to documents stored anywhere on the enterprise content management platform. From within any and every Office application, users can thus view platform content via their regular Windows Explorer.
To facilitate user and group management, TILAK deploys yet another add-on module from Hyperwave to provide LDAP access to its central metadirectory (LDAP stands for „Lightweight Directory Access Protocol“). Users‘ SAP master data is synchronized with the Hyperwave user administration system via the LDAP gateway, thereby ensuring role-based and secure access to all enterprise knowledge. The considerable effort involved in manually updating user data is therefore a thing of the past.
Strict user authentication and the systematic assignment of documents to defined classes efficiently governs access rights and protects sensitive data. Existing sets of old documents can be digitized and added thanks to an integrated scanning and mail-in system.
In future, Dr. Reiter envisages a single knowledge management system spanning the whole of the TILAK organization. „When we have done our homework, digitized all important paper documents and got the first 400 users accustomed to the new platform, we will explore the possibility of expanding the solution. Right now we are using it for classical administrative activities and for the ISO-accredited departments. Since TILAK operates multiple sites all over Tirol, however, I can well imagine us adding an e-conferencing component too.“
About TILAK
Tiroler Landeskrankenanstalten GmbH (TILAK) sees its core mission as optimizing the medical care provided to the people of Tirol. TILAK is the legal entity charged with running the regional government‘s hospitals in the Austrian state. In its capacity as a professional healthcare provider, TILAK constantly strives to optimize the care and service its hospitals provide as patients‘ needs continually evolve. Please find more information on TILAK at www.tilak.at