4 Hospital Communication Systems to Consider for Your Facility
Hospital communication between departments is of vital importance, especially to prevent medical jargon from being misinterpreted and using simple language for alert messages.
Hospital work is often an intensive and interrupt-driven environment. To increase communication in hospitals, various strategies have been put in place such as leadership town hall meetings, newsletters, and customer satisfaction champions.
Overhead Paging
An overhead paging system is one of the main tools hospitals utilize to communicate with their employees and patients. These networked speakers broadcast announcements or instructions in case of emergencies such as fire or tornado warnings, or regular updates. They may even be activated to sound sirens when necessary to alert personnel of potentially life-threatening situations like fire.
These systems also enable healthcare professionals to pre-record and distribute important information during emergencies like code blue alerts. This type of healthcare overhead paging system for hospitals & medical offices provides accurate communication during an emergency while eliminating confusion or panic among staff members. Hospitals can broadcast announcements to specific zones so only those who require hearing the announcement hear it without any unnecessary alarms being activated.
An added benefit of hospital paging systems is their ability to decrease noise in healthcare facilities. By employing smartphone-based systems, healthcare staff can page each other directly from their phones rather than having to use speakers or pager devices of a traditional paging system. Furthermore, this system allows localized paging, so healthcare staff can page only patients or visitors in their area rather than throughout the whole facility.
Emergency alerts via smartphone-based systems have the added benefit of eliminating overhead paging. Overhead paging can generate excessive noise that distracts both patients and staff members and may interfere with essential operations like resident education during rounds. A recent study indicated that using such an alternative for all staff paging resulted in sound levels falling below World Health Organization thresholds, providing patients and staff members with peace.
Color Code Paging
While hospital paging systems are essential to keeping communication flowing smoothly, they may not always convey all the essential details surrounding an emergency. Hospitals must switch away from colored code messages in favor of more comprehensive messaging solutions that cover multiple situations while offering customized alerts based on user requirements.
One way of accomplishing this goal is through the use of a critical communications system, like the pager-based messaging platform from Spok. These solutions enable hospitals to send lifesaving alerts quickly while also providing an overview of an incident. Furthermore, Spock’s pager-based messaging solutions integrate with clinical collaboration platforms for unified message delivery.
Hospital codes such as code blue and code red indicate medical or physical security emergencies that require immediate attention. Along with outlining what has occurred, these messages also provide details regarding who will respond as quickly as possible to help reduce panicked bystander interference with patient care.
Although hospital codes provide many advantages, their meaning varies between hospitals. This can confuse hospital personnel who must interpret multiple emergency codes; and even threaten patient safety in some instances.
Some hospitals are now making strides toward decreasing overhead paging by shifting communications of emergencies away from color codes; however, their usage remains popular until standardization occurs and they become the main form of communicating healthcare emergencies to hospital employees.
Text Messaging
Communication within hospitals is often time-sensitive; text message reminders make this easy for staff and patients alike. Also great for communicating emergency alerts or prescription refill reminders as well as collecting feedback or survey results.
SMS software has quickly become a go-to choice for healthcare facilities, providing HIPAA-compliant solutions (https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/security/laws-regulations/index.html) that offer automated communication in an entirely secure way. Missed appointments cost hospitals an estimated $150 billion each year; SMS reminders have proven successful at decreasing no-show rates by 20%! Furthermore, patients can ask doctors questions regarding test results or health concerns via two-way text messaging so their doctors can respond swiftly and accurately.
Most smartphones contain text messaging applications that may expose protected health information (PHI). A medical industry-specific messaging app offers clinicians a more secure method to share patient info within and outside their hospital walls and integrate seamlessly into internal systems for greater productivity.
Based on your organization’s needs, messaging platforms can be customized to integrate seamlessly with various scheduling, on-call, and EHR applications. Some even feature hospital directories so users can easily locate anyone within the system whether it be nurses, doctors, or administrators.
Tier 3 hospital solutions may cost more, but their benefits often outweigh their costs over time. An advanced telehealth application, for instance, can speed up discharge processes and get beds ready faster for new patients to improve overall care and safety – often through automation which eliminates human intervention for faster accuracy in information delivery – not to mention remote monitoring to identify high-risk situations and intervene promptly before they spiral into disaster situations.
Hospitals as healthcare facilities typically employ multiple communication systems that range from traditional voice services like telephone lines to more modern technologies like digital signage and SMS messaging. Each provides its distinct service while all contributing towards providing important information in real-time.
Hospitals need to quickly relay information in case of an emergency, such as mass casualty incidents requiring staff to report back immediately to designated areas. Combining multiple modes of communication like digital signage, overhead paging, and SMS messaging ensures that staff receive all of the relevant details necessary to take appropriate steps in response.
Email communication in hospitals is another vital form of interaction between patients and physicians, making communication quick and efficient. However, any message containing personal health data like this must be encrypted before being sent securely – otherwise sensitive information could fall into the wrong hands and compromise a patient. In addition, hospitals must implement strict protocols ensuring staff do not share sensitive information outside the workplace.
Hospitals use various means of communication with their employees besides email, such as text messages, centralized computer notification screens, and automated voice announcements to reach all areas simultaneously with critical information. By circumventing traditional email’s limitations, these alternative communication systems allow hospitals to inform both remote workers as well as those working directly inwards quickly about essential updates and messages – even within multiple departments simultaneously!