Spok, Inc. announced today that long-time customer Banner Health, headquartered in Phoenix, Ariz., is using Spok® clinical alerting to improve its process for code blue and neonatal intensive care (NICU) alerts. The result is faster response to critical situations and, ultimately, well-coordinated patient care and safety.
Banner Health recently added clinical alerting to its Spok solutions for operator console, paging, web directory, on-call scheduling, and speech recognition. Cippy Seidler, call center director at Banner Health, presented a webinar on December 9 that provided more detail about how Banner Health is using Spok solutions to improve clinical workflows.
“We integrated Spok’s clinical alerting solution with our nurse call system,” said Seidler. “Codes now come through significantly faster.” She explained that the previous code blue process involved a nurse talking to an operator, then the operator writing down information and initiating an overhead page message to the staff. “We’ve taken out the manual steps. Now codes pop up on an operator’s screen when a nurse hits the code button and operators can page staff immediately.”
In addition to code blues, Banner Health is also using Spok’s clinical alerting solution in the NICU for monitoring their smallest patients. If a baby’s monitoring system detects changes in vital signs, it automatically sends an alert message to the assigned nurse. If the nurse cannot respond immediately, Spok handles the escalation by alerting the next-available nurse. “We no longer need to physically monitor changes in vitals,” said Seidler. “The messaging is all automated. The time savings from Spok can improve patient safety and help us give our patients the best care.”
About Banner Health
Headquartered in Phoenix, Banner Health
is one of the largest, nonprofit health care systems in the country. The
system manages 25 acute-care hospitals, the Banner Health Network and
Banner Medical Group, long-term care centers, outpatient surgery centers
and an array of other services including family clinics, home care and
hospice services, and a nursing registry. Banner Health is in seven
states: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada and
Wyoming. For more information, visit www.BannerHealth.com.
About Spok
Spok, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Spok
Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: SPOK), headquartered in Springfield, Va., is
proud to be a leader in critical communications for healthcare,
government, public safety, and other industries. We deliver smart,
reliable solutions to help protect the health, well-being, and safety of
people around the globe. More than 125,000 organizations worldwide rely
on Spok for workflow improvement, secure texting, paging services,
contact center optimization, and public safety response. When
communications matter, Spok delivers. Visit us at spok.com or
find us on Twitter @Spoktweets.
Spok is a trademark of Spok Holdings, Inc.