Kodak Alaris Helps NHS Trust Go Digital Faster

Challenge

The Trust runs a network of hospital services across three sites. Each location had a centralised scanning function where patient records were digitised before being uploaded into Cito, the Trust’s cloud-based Electronic Health Record (EHR) software.

The biggest challenge was that the legacy scanners were ageing, prone to breakdown and due to their age, unsupported by the manufacturer. If a scanner at any one site was not working, staff had to load a van and drive the documents to another location so that they could be scanned – this was both a time and cost-inefficient chore.

When visiting the pathology department in one of the hospitals, medical records staff saw a scanner from Kodak Alaris in action. Impressed by the speed, high quality image capture and accuracy of data representation, they immediately contacted Kodak Alaris to find out how high speed production scanners could help them improve efficiency.

Solution

A pre-sales consultation flagged up a number of issues that the medical records scanning staff needed to address. The team reviewed the current workflow, analysed the different types of documents that needed to be scanned and dug deep to understand priorities, SLAs for turnaround times, and the process for uploading digital data into Cito.

Kodak Alaris recommended the Kodak i5650 Scanner which delivers the high volume throughput, fast processing speed, smooth paper flow, and document handling versatility the Trust required.

With an upgrade for Cito on the cards, the team from Kodak Alaris liaised directly with the software vendor to create a customised solution that would eliminate any delay in uploading the digital data to the EHR.  Kodak Alaris built a customisation module for Kodak Capture Pro software, that would enable both solutions to ‘talk to one another’ so that digitised images could be uploaded to Cito in real-time, rather than be held in a temporary file before a daily update took place overnight.

Benefits

After a demonstration of the scanner and customised software in action, the Trust conducted a six week trial.

The trial period was a huge success with staff reporting extremely high levels of satisfaction with the solution’s performance, speed and accuracy. Most notably the biggest value-add was the ability to scan paper records directly into the hospital’s EHR, providing clinicians with faster access to accurate, up-to-date information, enabling speedier diagnosis and decision-making.

Immediately following the trial, the Trust ordered three Kodak i5650 Scanners and the same number of Kodak Capture Pro Licences – one for each of its three sites, alongside service contracts to ensure maximum uptime. Kodak Alaris also provided Professional Services, deploying the customised solution across all three locations and delivering end-user training to ensure staff could be up and running without delay.

With the new solution, the volume of data captured each day has grown exponentially, thanks to the powerful new scanners, and there is no delay in making that information accessible. Prior to rolling out the solution from Kodak Alaris, the Trust worked to a ‘next business day’ SLA to ingest digital information into Cito. Once scanned, images are now directly uploaded to the EHR cloud software which powers a real-time single view of each patient by unifying and structuring clinical data into customisable virtual electronic health records.