Hospital Pablo Tobón Uribe | Colombia | Case study
Enhancing the reporting culture of your organization
High levels of patient safety and process quality are a business-critical requirement for healthcare institutions all over the world. To meet this requirement, Hospital Pablo Tobón Uribe in Medellín, Colombia, has been using the TPSC Cloud™ for three years. TPSC's easy-to-use solution has optimized incident and risk management by improving data collection and facilitating follow-up actions. Moreover, it has enhanced the reporting culture in the hospital.
Hospital Pablo Tobón Uribe in Medellín Colombia, is a medium-sized hospital with 1,700 employees and nearly 400 beds. Three of the hospital's employees described their experiences with the TPSC platform: Patricia Estrada - Head of Improvement, Erika del Río - who works as a nurse and is responsible for clinical risk management, and Jorge Restrepo Sierra - a systems analyst.
Patricia explained the reasons for seeking an external provider for an overall healthcare system: "In 1997, we acquired a free program. This solution was not very reliable- reports had to be made on paper and were sometimes lost. What's more, this program was a single-user system, so it took a long time before everyone concerned had access to information and was able to take action. A couple of years ago, the Colombian Department of Health provided us with a free application, but it didn't meet our requirements. For instance, reports had to be entered centrally and the application didn't offer any analytical tools. We first found out about the TPSC platform during my visit to the International Forum on Quality and Safety held in Barcelona in 2007. We purchased the system a few years later, as soon as a Spanish version was available".
“There are no problems, and support is always available, despite the time difference between Colombia and the Netherlands.”
Convincing features
What were the main criteria that encouraged the hospital to choose TPSC Cloud™ Erika answered: "This was the first time we met a company that was specifically dedicated to the issue of patient safety. We immediately were convinced of the advantages of their solution: parameters according to WHO guidelines, a user-friendly system that enables multiple users, the presence of a tool for incident analysis and the incorporation of tools for analyzing incidents, adverse events or risks, such as the London Protocol, cause-and-effect diagrams and causal trees. The TPSC platform also enables us to define a workflow for incidents involving multidisciplinary analysis. And last but not least, we were very pleased with TPSC's business proposition in terms of cost, implementation and support."
The hospital has now been using the platform for seven years. Jorge: "We use each of the platform's standard modules: TPSC Notify, TPSC Investigate, TPSC Anticipate and TPSC Improve. Our staff uses this functionality for managing incidents and risks, and for problems related to medical devices and supplies. The TPSC Improve module helps us develop corrective and preventive actions in the hospital, not necessarily resulting from an adverse event or incident. It also helps us in designing a program for auditing processes."
Easy implementation
Patricia described the hospital staff's overall experiences with the platform: "People in our hospital really wanted this application. After an easy implementation with excellent assistance and training by TPSC, advantages were immediately visible. We already had a reporting culture, but with slow procedures, and now reporting has become much more efficient. In the past, we did everything on paper and it took about a month to get an overview of a problem. Now, awareness is immediate. This enables us to establish how we are doing, decide which measures to take, perform follow-ups and obtain monthly statistics."
Erika mentioned some further advantages: "The system is easy to use, and parameters can be implemented in the applications, enabling us to make in-depth analyses and take corrective measures. It also facilitates monitoring of the status of actions over time, and provides a better visualization of the measures taken. Moreover, corrective and preventive measures and projects for improvement can easily be included. Overall, the platform facilitates and promotes organizational learning."
Excellent partner in patient safety
To conclude, Jorge is highly enthusiastic about the quality of the services provided by TPSC: "They are excellent! There are no problems, and support is always available, despite the time difference between Colombia and the Netherlands. This includes technical support as well as support for creating applications.
TPSC staff also travels to our hospital to provide training when new updates for the tool become available. What's more, TPSC have taught our employees what they need to do to properly document each analysis. In short, plenty of reasons to work with TPSC for many years to come!"
More information?
Are you interested in more information about the TPSC Cloud™ software? Please request an online demonstration without obligation. Become acquainted with the software in half an hour and discover the many possibilities it offers.
