Virtual Nursing: Reduce Hospital Turnover Costs
- Hospitals must prioritize workflow improvement to remain competitive,according to FJ Campbell,chief medical officer at Ardent Health.
- "We needed to better recruit and retain staff," Campbell said.
- Campbell believes virtual nursing technology considerably advances Ardent's workflow improvement initiatives.
Discover how ardent Health is revolutionizing care and slashing costs with virtual nursing.This innovative approach directly tackles hospital turnover costs by lightening the load on on-site RNs. Using virtual nurses to manage routine tasks frees up valuable time for critical patient care, as seen in the reduction of nurse turnover from 15.5% to 9.5%. Experience how streamlined workflows lead to boosted efficiency and happier nurses. Furthermore, virtual consults cut unnecessary transfers by a staggering 85%. For more on the intersection of tech and healthcare, News Directory 3 has the details.Discover what’s next for these advancements.
Ardent Health Sees Workflow Betterment with Virtual Nursing Technology
Updated May 29,2024
Hospitals must prioritize workflow improvement to remain competitive,according to FJ Campbell,chief medical officer at Ardent Health. Speaking at the Reuters Digital Health conference in Nashville last month, campbell emphasized the pandemic’s exposure of overwhelming hospital workflows. These cumbersome processes contributed to staff burnout, high turnover, and reliance on contract labour.
“We needed to better recruit and retain staff,” Campbell said. “Their message was clear: ‘What can you do to improve my workflow burden?'”
Campbell believes virtual nursing technology considerably advances Ardent’s workflow improvement initiatives. By implementing this technology, Ardent offloads routine and cognitively demanding tasks from on-site registered nurses (RNs). This team-based approach increases efficiency and clarifies roles. Virtual nurses manage tasks like discharges, patient history collection, and hourly rounding. This frees on-site nurses to focus on patient monitoring and test readiness.
“On-site RNs spend more time focusing on the patient care plan and monitoring patients,” Campbell explained. “Thay have more time for oversight,identifying who is deteriorating,improving,or ready for discharge.”
Ardent’s nurses appreciate the reduced cognitive burden. Since implementing virtual nurse technology, the health system’s nurse turnover rate has dropped from 15.5% to 9.5%, Campbell said.
This reduction could lead to significant cost savings, considering the average cost of recruiting a nurse is $40,000, he added.
“Nurses feel less stressed, actually get lunch, and leave on time,” Campbell remarked. “That’s why we feel this is enduring—because they’re less burned out.”
The success of virtual nursing has expanded virtual consults with specialty physicians,including cardiologists,nephrologists,and neurologists,in rural hospitals.
Campbell noted these virtual consults reduce unnecessary transfers to tertiary centers by 85% and increase the level of care available in rural facilities.
“Patients appreciate getting care in their community,rather than traveling an hour to a tertiary care center,” he stated.
as Ardent scales its virtual care strategy, Campbell said the goal remains easing clinicians’ cognitive burden while improving patient access to care.
What’s next
Ardent plans to further integrate virtual care solutions to enhance efficiency and patient outcomes across its network,focusing on expanding specialty consults and reducing clinician burnout.