THE CHALLENGE
For over 30 years, the Algoma Health Unit (AHU) has provided public health services to citizens of the Algoma district. With offices in Blind River, Elliot Lake, Sault Ste. Marie and Wawa, AHU has a large geographical area to provide services to. Case managers, public health nurses, family support workers, health practitioners and public health inspectors work in these areas across a very broad constituency. Like many health organizations across North America, AHU was facing the need to continuously communicate with staff in the district, to have the ability to respond quickly and efficiently to any situation where there could be a potential public health or staff safety risk.
THE APPROACH
To address the problem, AHU embarked on a process of redesigning their communication and response processes and policies, the result being the revision of policies and procedures and the use of automation for employee tracking, communications and response processes.
The new process required an “off-hours” call centre to track and communicate with staff. A manual solution created operational bottlenecks and increased costs.
After careful review of the manual solution by health unit management which included consultation with the Health and Safety Committee, a decision was made to evaluate a computerized solution called TeleSafety, offered by Datatel.
THE SOLUTION
A team, led by Suzanne Irwin, System/Records Manager, examined multiple employee tracking and response requirements. It was important that a staff tracking system did more than just collect data and document safety issues. Immediate alerts, notifications to management and responses to situations where an “out-call” professional may be in a precarious position, were a priority.
While it was clear that moving from a manual/people intensive system to track staff electronically when responding to potential safety situations was crucial, management felt strongly that attention needed to be paid to the work processes surrounding the solutions as well. Working closely with the Health and Safety Committee plus employees, their input ensured that the solution selection, as well as the timing of implementation, would meet the immediate need to track employees with the ability to respond quickly and efficiently to potential risk situations.
The agency appreciated that with TeleSafety there was continuous, open, two-way channel of communication with staff. Information was tracked in real-time - thus eliminating the need for dedicated human resources’ personnel to manually monitor - all that was required was the standard issue, field employee mobile phone.
Today, when staff are leaving on a visit request, all they do is pick-up their mobile phone, and in less than 60 seconds they provide key information though a self-service IVR Telephone portal. When they have completed the visit, the practitioner will simply call-in and sign-out, with the option to set the parameters for the next visit. In the event a practitioner forgets to sign-out, TeleSafety will place an automated reminder call, with the option to postpone the sign-out time. In the event that an employee fails to respond to the reminder call, then TeleSafety will automatically issue alerts to the field safety coordinators on call.
Program Directors and coordinators can monitor who is in the field and where. Safety officers can review the logs on an historical or real-time basis and assess the effectiveness of safety policies, subsequently making improvements where required, based on “objective” data.
THE RESULTS
After TeleSafety was implemented, AHU reduced administrative costs associated with Employee Safety Tracking and Response processes by over 80%. “TeleSafety allows us to manage by exception, eliminate the need for a dispatcher, and eliminate the need for after-hours call centre support by 95% - resulting in significant operational savings.” With access to field employee information 24/7 over the web or via telephone, Program Directors and safety coordinators can make decisions in real time.
TeleSafety’s Embedded Audit Trail and management reporting allows AHU to focus on strategy, ensure compliance, and execute their safety policy.
TeleSafety’s ASP Model has provided AHU operations expertise with no overhead. With no need for additional infrastructure, TeleSafety implementation and deployment took days not months.
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This article can be freely published in a web site
As long as its not modified in any way including authors bylines,
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Barnard L. Crespi, is CEO and head of professional services at
Datatel Communications Inc, an IVR (Interactive Voice Response) Hosted Managed Service provider. And a publisher of many white papers and case studies on IVR.
To learn more about IVR business applications go to: IVR
http://www.datatel-systems.com
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