UK Leader Ensured of Highest Level of Personal Health Information
Schaumburg, IL and Bristol, UK (December 3, 2013) ––London based Ark Homecare offers a continuum of homecare and healthcare services from basic care support in the home to specialized nursing. The peace of mind of their customers and their loved ones is Ark’s highest priority and achieving their mission within a constrained resource environment requires intelligent deployment of technology.
Operationally Ark’s goal as a homecare provider is to provide better outcomes more cost effectively for their clients. Achieving these objectives requires improved operational efficiencies without substantial capital investments. After evaluating market options, Ark selected CellTrak Technologies and Coldharbour systems as their solution partner for their integrated mobile solution at the point of care.
By implementing an easy to use clinical assessment on a mobile device, CellTrak transformed how their field staff delivers care and improved compliance to the councils concerned about appropriate payment. Ark recently began using the CellTrak mobile care platform on new Samsung Note 3 devices which transformed their point of care assessment process while allowing for more time for care. Staff can utilize mobile to document care, capture signatures, dictations and photos at the point of care. Through the CellTrak quality and risk management portal real-time alerts are triggered through the assessment to assess care and direct workflow across the entire organization.
“We are able to start initial and follow up assessments at the point of care. We are also printing completed and easy to read assessments for the clients to leave at their home. Signature capture features are being used to sign electronically and streamline the completed visit process.”
Tracey Rodaway, Finance and IT Lead for Ark Healthcare
To maintain and support their mission Ark chose CellTrak to automate their full clinical assessment process. Once a multi paper based assessment process is now accessed in one easy to use app on the mobile device. The paper form is now a fully automated interactive tool, accessible anytime. Leveraging technology facilitates auto population, prompting and providing guidance in completing assessments, allowing for more person to person time with the client. The full clinical assessment includes client data, environment and risks associated with a client. Assessments are broken into 23 sections, for example, but not limited to medication risk, personal and contact details, and environment.
Ark is currently using Coldharbour to obtain the episode of care needed for each client. When they needed an easy way to capture data at the point of care and feed into their Coldharbour system, they felt mobile would be the best. CellTrak was able to deploy their HealthLink Integration Manager interface to create a real-time bridge into the Coldharbour system to the home of where care is provided. HealthLink provides the glue that connects multiple information sources, point of care devices and health information exchange partners.
“The interface development between CellTrak and the Coldharbour application is unique. This was a cornerstone requirement from the outset to allow our corporate clients a seamless interface from both applications capable of handling and verifying the volumes of data our largest clients generate. The culmination of the systems provides a genuine best of breed solution that has proven to be highly scalable and feature rich in the provision of mobile point of care solutions, “shared Mike Moreton, Sales Director for Coldharbour Systems.
Ms. Rodaway, added “The integration between CellTrak and Coldharbour allows for our schedules to be updated in real-time on staffs mobile devices. This feature allowed staff more time for visits and providing even more care for the clients. This feature allowed for an immediate response and coordination of staff to locations. We were excited and ready to get CellTrak and Coldharbour working together for a complete visit record.”
Assessors at Ark start the care delivery process by evaluating each client and creating the client specific plan of care. A carer is then dispatched to follow the care plan for the client in need. CellTrak quality and risk management portal supports assessors in ensuring safe quality of care as well as supporting staff in the client’s home. Portals identify variance to care allowing for early intervention to decrease acute care visits and exposure to preventable readmissions. Receiving actionable data from the home in real-time is key to reducing emergency room visits and avoidable hospital readmissions for high-risk population of seniors and individuals with acute and chronic illness. Compliance can be easily demonstrated to their councils to show care services were delivered at a specific time, in that home, for that client. CellTrak facilitates positive and improved outcomes from operations, carers and most importantly, their clients.
For an overview of the CellTrak mobile applications platform for homecare
Rodaway shared, “The true differentiator in the CellTrak Solution was
the messaging feature. This allows our team to use one system to document and communicate in a secure manner.”
Michael K. Wons, President and CEO of CellTrak Technologies added, “The leadership team at Ark had a clear vision to automate the care processes and address the re-enablement challenges set forth by the funders. In addition to improved communications amongst the care team and demonstrated improved care delivery, outstanding results of the condensed full clinical assessment was visible immediately after implementation. The Ark team provides a successful model for others and is a true leader in improving homecare delivery.”
For home and community care, technology will continue to shape the future of point-of-care service and compliance. No matter what technology appears next, the most important return is in the quality of care for the clients. The foremost goals in any home healthcare agency adding on a technology solution will remain the same: to manage costs, improve the quality of care and achieve the best possible outcomes and to give the client services that they need within their home.
About ARK Homecare:
Ark is a well-established and growing Homecare and Healthcare company looking after thousands of people across the UK in the safety and comfort of their own homes. In addition to providing a vast range of services to our private customers, we also work closely with 38 Local Authorities and 7 Primary Care Trusts. We are registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and are proud to deliver more than 28,000 hours of quality care every week to the most important people in our organization - our customers. For more information please visit: http://www.arkhealth.co.uk/
About Coldharbour Systems:
Founded in 1986, Coldharbour Systems have been providing our clients with a safe pair of hands whilst many other IT suppliers have come and gone. The undisputed industry leader reputation that Coldharbour enjoys has been built on customer loyalty, won through many years of excellent service for hundreds of clients across thousands of sites over the UK. For more information please visit: www.coldharbour-systems.co.uk