February 18, 2016 Industry news
On 9 February 2016, GS1 UK attended a fully booked open day at Royal Derby Hospital to see how they are using GS1 standards to make a real difference to patient safety and to their bottom line.
The day was hosted by Royal Derby Hospital and GS1 UK Industry Partner, Healthlogistics. Together they showcased the impact that compliant barcodes are having across the hospital. Royal Derby is a hospital with some big numbers, they treat one million patients a year, have 8,000 staff and 1,159 beds across 50 wards, and the work they’ve done to implement GS1 standards is no less impressive.
Since 2013, Derby have been rolling out scanning at point of use via a wristband issued to every inpatient, backed up by a catalogue and scanning system that uses GS1 standards to enable them to:
- Scan and check inpatients. Each member of staff also has their own barcode
- Track scopes/instrumentation to patients
- Track theatre and stockroom consumption
- Attribute cost to scope/instrumentation use
- Track planned maintenance
The information that GS1 barcodes gives them makes for a more automated process, minimising the need for manual intervention and the risk of human error. Kevin Downs, Director of Finance and Performance at Derby, explained the impact these changes have had on a financial and clinical level. They mean that he not only gets all the accurate and detailed management information that he needs, but he is also able to free up clinical staff to spend more time with patients. Read more about our work at Derby.
As with our other partners, Healthlogistics advocates the use of GS1 standards and worked closely with the Trust to develop a streamlined and automated process, enabling the capture of every single detail of their processes through the use of compliant barcodes.