Operating like clockwork at Odense University Hospital

The situation

The Gynaecology-Obstetrics department at Odense University Hospital, Svendborg (OUH) employs 19 doctors and performs 1,800 operations annually, of which 500 are at a central operating unit. Effective use of a central operating unit requires optimal coordination of staff, equipment and rooms across the various specialised departments. However, the department was relying purely on manual, paper-based calendars to coordinate its busy schedule of appointments and operations. Although the hospital staff had become expert in managing this system, it necessarily resulted in some inefficiencies. Changes made to a schedule in one place (for example to accommodate an emergency case) would not be reflected in other parts of the hospital without immediate communication between many staff. With the hospital under pressure to maximise efficiency, a smarter solution was required.

The solution

Staff at OUH surveyed the scheduling tools in use in other hospitals across Denmark and Sweden and decided that Capgemini’s Bookplan was the best suited to their needs. Bookplan has over 10,000 daily users in nearly 250 departments in Denmark, making it the most widely used system for scheduling treatment in the Danish health services. It handles the workflow that supports complex interdisciplinary planning, monitoring and execution of surgery. Bookplan’s large-screen solution provides interactive graphic representations of the operating schedules, which replace conventional methods such as whiteboards. The system can be configured to schedule appointments intelligently according to the working methods of any department, but also allows staff to change statuses and schedules on screen with their fingertips, with the updates passed to their colleagues across the hospital system in real time. By integrating the operating schedule and workflow with the electronic health records (EHRs) of patients, Bookplan makes all of the key data readily available to practitioners.

The result

After approximately five months of preparation, Bookplan went live in OUH on January 12, 2009. It has been running smoothly ever since, and OUH still has a maintenance agreement with Capgemini. The results speak for themselves:

• Four operations every Monday has become five most weeks, with the same resources. That is at least a 20% increase in capacity with no added cost.
• The number of telephone calls has fallen drastically, because everyone can read a patient’s status via a monitor.
• Family members receive information more quickly, as their calls do not have to be transferred.
• Patients have the benefit of being able to choose their appointment times from the earliest stage in their treatment, thanks to better transparency and coordination of resources.

Capgemini configured the system to the requirements of the department at OUH, and provided change management support to ensure a successful implementation.