The Client
Rambam Medical Center is a state-run university hospital and the tertiary referring hospital for 12 hospitals in northern Israel, serving a population of more than two million patients. Rambam Medical Center has approximately 1,000 internal hospital beds, 57 inpatient departments, 73 recognized medical units for training interns and 113 outpatient clinics.
The Challenges
As a leading university medical center in Israel, Rambam Medical Center faced several key challenges:
Simplifying and streamlining complex administrative processes:
Employees of all types were spending over 20% of their time dealing with matters and processes unrelated to their core occupation. In the best case, these were documented on spreadsheet and in the worst case, on pen and paper or not at all. Processes that were computerized were performed on many small applications, or on a legacy system that placed a huge burden on staff.
JCI Accreditation:
The medical center required initial accreditation by JCI )Joint Commission International), and continuous support for the accreditation. JCI accreditation required the center to operate according to standardized, transparent and efficient work processes.
Permissions Management:
The multiplicity and high criticality of clinical work processes in the medical center required constant management of training processes to grant specific authorizations for each position holder. This was intensified by the high turnover of specialized physicians and transfers within the center and between other medical centers.
Interns Lifecycle Management:
The center required support for optimal training processes for hundreds of interns from many different fields. Training is mandatory, and takes between 3 and 6 years, under clear regulations dictated by the Israel Medical Association. At the medical center, the complex training and authorization process was being performed manually, with minimal supervision. There was a need for substantial improvement and digitization of the entire process.
Management of Employees’ Qualifications:
The center needed a simplified, ongoing solution for the administration of complex training and qualification procedures for over 5000 staff members, under severe budgetary constraints.
Becoming a Learning Organization:
To maintain its position at the forefront of research and knowledge, the medical center needed to transform into a “Learning Organization”. This required the establishment of communities of knowledge, enabling efficient knowledge sharing between members from different fields, via an accessible computerized infrastructure.
The Solution
Rambam Medical Center chose to implement the Blossom platform as a total, unified and integrated solution that solved all the organization’s challenges.
Previously, Rambam Medical Center employees had to log in and use 8 different computerized systems. Thanks to Blossom Platform, employees are now required to work with only 3 computerized systems.
Leveraging Blossom’s platform, the medical center is managing its distributed learning environment in a much more efficient and cost-effective manner, while remaining within the severe constraints of the organization’s budget.
Gaining JCI accreditation:
By using the Blossom platform, the medical center ensured it met all JCI demands, and JCI accreditation was achieved in 2016. The Blossom solution enables the center to continuously maintain the high standards necessary for annual re-accreditation.
Significant streamlining of a wide range of administrative processes:
The Blossom platform enabled complete computerized support for the complex organizational structure of the medical center:
- Computerization and automation of on-boarding processes of new employees to the medical center.
- Optimized, centralized scheduling of operating rooms. This enabled the center to increase the use rate of operating rooms, perform more surgeries and shorten the surgical wait lists.
- Registration and approval procedures for events, courses and conferences external to the medical center were implemented. This included the computerized handling of payments, vacation days, expense reimbursement and approval sequences.
- Simple, self-contained computerization and optimization of manual processes, eliminating the use of many printed forms, enabling significant paper and cost savings.
- Implementation of independent online employee learning, reducing physical class-based learning, and reducing the need to take staff away from their workplaces for ongoing training.
- The internal video and collaboration module facilitated communication between medical team members, and training sessions for remote team members.
- Transformation of employees’ personal files and evaluations into digital portfolios, enabling transparency and accessibility of personal information to employees and managers in one central place.
- Various capabilities were implemented to assist in the ongoing management of the medical departments:
- Computerization of all internal formal meetings, such as: journal clubs, staff meetings, meetings of medical files and more.
- Planning fellowships, and rotations of employees in other departments.
- Future planning of vacation days and expected employee absences.
- Establishing a dedicated computerized portal for each department.
- Decentralizing of training processes, enabling the Program Director of each department to plan and manage internal training for the department staff only. Each department operates with autonomy in its staff development and promotions, without needing to involve the center’s training director.
Permissions management:
The Blossom Permission Management Module enabled the medical center to manage, control, and monitor all training processes that allow authorization to be granted for all types of clinical activities. The various permissions given to members of the medical teams are managed easily and centrally, and are stored in the computerized file of each medical officer.
Computerized, streamlined residents’ management:
The advanced Blossom platform enabled the planning, management and ongoing monitoring of all interns in various stages of internship.
Blossom’s advanced APIs have the capability to interface with the Patient Medical File system, solving two fundamental problems:
- Documentation and follow-up of all compulsory activities performed by interns during their internship.
- Increased involvement of senior physicians who coached interns during the performance of the medical activities, enabling a more effective evaluation process.
Ensuring maximum staff competency and boosting job performance:
The Blossom platform streamlined the entire process of accreditation and training at Rambam Medical Center, so that at any given moment, each staff member of the many thousands employed at the center is properly qualified.