Ardent Health CMO says virtual care can save hospital money on turnover costs
Ardent Health Chief Medical Officer FJ Campbell said that in today’s era, hospitals can no longer ignore improvements in workflows.
He pointed this in an interview at the Reuters Digital Health Conference in Nashville last month, noting that the pandemic stressed the overwhelmingness of hospital workflows. Campbell explains that the fragmented, cumbersome nature of these workflows leads to high levels of burnout and error in employees, as well as an unsustainable dependence on contract labor.
“We need to be in a situation where we better recruit and retain the employees we have. Most of their information boils down to: 'What can you do to improve my workflow burden?'” he said.
Campbell believes that virtual care technology has been one of the most influential tools to advance Ardent’s workflow improvement efforts.
By implementing the technical infrastructure for virtual nurses, Ardent is uninstalling conventional and cognitive taxation tasks from field RNS. Campbell said this team-based model improves efficiency and makes character descriptions clearer. Virtual nurses care for tasks such as discharge, collecting patient history and hourly circular, and nurses attending in the unit have more time to monitor patients or prepare for imaging tests.
“[On-site RNs] Spend more time focusing on the patient’s care plan and monitoring those patients who are experiencing a care continuum – patients who are actually losing the ground or deteriorating, improving, who are being improved, can be discharged earlier. They have more time to oversee,” Campbell explained.
Ardent's nurses seem to appreciate the cognitive burden reduction. Campbell said that since the implementation of virtual nurse technology, nurse turnover in the health system has dropped from 15.5% to 9.5%.
He added that this could save a lot of money in the long run, as the average cost of recruiting nurses is $40,000.
“If you’re a nurse, what does that mean, ‘I’m very stressed at work, I actually got lunch and I left on time.’ That’s why we feel it’s so sustainable – because they’re exhausted at work,” Campbell said.
The success of virtual care has also led to virtual consultations from specialists in rural hospitals such as cardiologists, nephrologists and neurologists.
Campbell notes that these virtual consultations are transferring unnecessary to the third-level center and improve the care acuity that patients can obtain in rural facilities.
“Patients appreciate the fact that they are finally getting care in the community without having to walk an hour to a level 3 nursing center they don’t want to go,” he said.
As Ardent continues to expand its virtual care strategy, Campbell says the goal remains the same: alleviate the cognitive burden of clinicians while providing patients with the care they deserve.
Photo: Sdecoret, Getty Images
