Union Hospital-China bags two awards at the Healthcare Asia Awards 2018

The hospital won the Facilities Improvement Initiative of the Year and the ICT Initiative of the Year

Renovation works in Union Hospital (UH) have increased dramatically in recent years. Implementation of a safety system is crucial to maintain a reliable and healthy hospital environment, to achieve zero tolerance of wound infections caused by dust contamination in Operating Theatre (OPT), and to have a comprehensive prevention of Pneumoconiosis. Usually, preventive measures during renovation included sealing up of the work sites with hoarding and use of exhaust fan.

In 2014, UH strengthened its measures and implemented a 5-step renovation process to further enhance the safety of patients, workers, and staff. This renovation process comprised of risk assessment meeting among stakeholders prior to the renovation work, issuance of working permit, comprehensive training provided to workers, implementation of Renovation Monitoring System, and evaluation and continuous quality improvement during the entire renovation process.

Air change per hour (ACH), an outstanding feature of the project, was calculated to ensure ventilation provided was in compliance with the ANSI/ASHRAE/ASHE Standard 170-2008 (>12 ACH). Both digital and mechanical manometers were utilised as a counter check mechanism to ensure accurate measure of negative pressure value in the sealed work site with an alarm set up to notify users if pressure below -10 Pa. Meanwhile, the end of the extended flexible exhaust hose was held by an adjustable drip stand. The hose could be adjusted to the working site with the highest dust concentration. The other end was connected to the inlet of a powerful exhaust fan which maximised the exhaust effect. The exhaust fan was assembled with recycled materials from discarded HVAC system and was very cost effective. An air flow test tube was applied at the entrance area to confirm that the air was sucked in by negative pressure.

Union Hospital was also the regional pioneer to deploy mobile point of care solution. Given that “Patient Safety” is always on the top of UH's evolution agenda, the hospital has sought to enhance its Mobile Clinical Solution (MCS) with new elements by aligning the innovative health information technologies to the day-to-day functions. From nursing care to doctor consultation, electronic prescription to examination request, hospital-centric to patient-centric, MCS was equipped with universal features to support the clinical workflow and to facilitate an accurate and evidence-based decision making in all domains. Together with the Bring Your Own Device and cloud technology, MCS not only covers the patient journey from admission onward, but also the treatment after discharge. In addition, MCS involves everyone at different levels and of different interest in the patient journey, including nurses, doctors, allied health professionals and even patients. All of them are able to access up-to-date clinical information at the fingertips via their own devices, be it an iOS or Android.

With MCS, most of the traditional workflow can be streamlined and optimised by digitising the manual tasks. Along with the just-in time information and wireless access capability, the communication across the multidisciplinary medical team and the patient can be greatly enhanced, while staff can free up their time to act as efficiently and effectively as practicable, patients are able to take more control and responsibility on their own care, and ultimately result in better healthcare outcomes by increasing the medication adherence. All in all, patient confidence in UH's service as well as staff satisfaction have both been greatly enhanced, and a strong hospital-patient relationship is formed. Doctors, nurses, allied health professionals and patients are all benefit from it.

Because of these projects, Union Hospital won the Facilities Improvement Initiative of the Year and the ICT Initiative of the Year at the Healthcare Asia Awards 2018.

The Healthcare Asia Awards 2018 was held on 23 May 2018 at the Conrad Centennial Singapore.

This year's nominations were judged by a panel consisting of Abhay Bangi, Partner, Life Sciences & Healthcare Lead, Ernst & Young; Mohit Grover, Life Sciences & Healthcare Leader,
Deloitte, and; Sabrina Tay, Partner and Deputy Industry Lead, Healthcare RSM Singapore.

Check out the event photos during the awards night here.

If you would like to join the 2019 awards and be awarded as one of the most outstanding healthcare companies in the region, please email Marianne at [email protected] or click here for more information.