Mobile technology for Taranaki public health nurses

Chief Information Officer, Ngaio Crook said, “Our work with the Exodesk and Spark on the Transsend healthcare mobile technology platform was a great example of Taranaki leading the charge.

The Public Health Nursing team are now able to eliminate the time-consuming paperwork from their day and focus on what is truly important - the patient. All information is captured electronically and is made available on the patient’s health record in real-time.”

Partnership and cooperation is the key

“The key to the success of what we have created is an absolute partnership between our clinical people and our IT team to build something that is a true enabler. It will save time and improve patient safety for the people of Taranaki.

Enabling our clinicians, who work in the community, through the ‘anywhere, anytime’ healthcare mobile technology of Transsend has realised many benefits. Our public health nursing team is now much more connected in their working day. They can access patient information securely and generate patient encounter information in real time,” said Crook.

Willingness to share

Significantly, the collateral that Taranaki DHB is gathering can be shared and re-used by other DHB’s and healthcare providers. “If we had a number of DHB’s using this technology who we could share and collaborate with, we would speed up what can be delivered to our clinicians across the country,” said Crook.

The fluidity of the Transsend software solution means that this is just the beginning for Taranaki DHB. There are many more opportunities for them to improve clinical workflows and patient safety. The application of this technology can be utilized in a variety of settings.

Clever integration saves time and money

Taranaki DHB, IT Project Manager, John Moodie said; “We have integrated Transsend into our existing systems and created an end to end view. This is a big deal for us. Once you have captured the data on the mobile device, it can be routed to multiple endpoints both within the Taranaki DHB and with partner organisations who need to be aware of events that affect patients in common.

So, it is a way to integrate health services and make better connections with wider public services. We also estimate the cost savings at around $60,000 per annum in time and consumables alone.”

Public Health Nurses enjoy more time with patients

“We see Transsend as a real positive for public health nurses and our patients,” said Taranaki DHB Public Health Nurse, Kelly Iremonger. “Electronic form filling has many benefits, the most valuable being that it gives us more time with patients. Furthermore, we have a complete patient history to hand and one that is more confidential because it is encrypted and held electronically. And the health benefits of not having to lift heavy bags of patient files is also a huge benefit,” said Iremonger.

Taranaki DHB are very impressed with the capability of Transsend

They have since rolled it out to their Allied Health staff as well as all their public health nurses. Exodesk Director, Ruth Bruce says; “Taranaki DHB’s decision to move to an integrated healthcare mobile technology data platform is bold and forward-thinking. Their model is a microcosm of what can be achieved in the wider community, and we applaud their collaborative and innovative approach.”

Exodesk is a New Zealand owned company, which has operated in the digital space for more than 15 years. In that time, they have set a gold standard in the secure and swift flow of data using mobile devices. They work with public and private sector organisations in New Zealand and overseas, including Statistics NZ.