For anyone selling a product or service, the sense of urgency for their target market to purchase is often at the forefront of any marketing or advertising strategy and for the benefit of the seller. In the facilities management industry, however, the urgency is well-warranted, as it provides benefits for both the buyer and the seller. For certain FM sectors such as healthcare, purchasing FM software is imperative for safety, security, and growth. With the changing landscape of the healthcare workforce post-COVID, automating and optimizing daily tasks for healthcare workers provides much-needed relief to an understaffed industry, allowing workers to focus on what’s most important, their patients. Here, our team of healthcare facility software specialists at SCLogic unpack why now is the time to invest in an FM software such as Intra and the many benefits a comprehensive platform provides. 

Combating the Healthcare Worker Shortage with Automation

During the entirety of the pandemic, there was, and still is, a significant shift in the healthcare system. Healthcare workers became exhausted during the influx of coronavirus patients, and although cases have dialed down in hospitals, the shortage of workers remains. Did you know that nearly 20% of healthcare workers quit their job during the pandemic? To combat this shortage and the growing demand for healthcare services, it’s projected that there will need to be 1.2 million new registered nurses (RNs) by 2030 to address this shortage. Although there is a slight leveling of supply to demand as the pandemic slows, this issue is nowhere close to being resolved. Without the ability to hire more workers quickly, healthcare facilities must invest in areas they can control, such as implementing software to automate time-intensive tasks. 

While there are tasks that cannot be automated for hospital staff, administrative tasks, maintenance, and asset management can be optimized through logistics software. For example, administrative tasks such as room booking for care team meetings and maintenance requests can be made simple with Intra’s Workplace Services Workgroup. Furthermore, you can optimize facility access through our Visitor Tracking Workflow, giving employees and visitors access to designated areas within your healthcare facility without having to follow them around. Lastly, our Asset Logistics Workgroup allows your team to monitor specific assets such as PPE supplies, lab transfers, and more with ease so that you are spending less time on mundane tasks each day.

Investing in Proactive Maintenance Strategy for Healthcare Assets

One reason we prioritize early investment in healthcare FM software is for asset management. Unfortunately, facilities of all sizes without a designated system are often left scrambling with reactive maintenance efforts, spending excessive time and money after equipment breaks. For healthcare facilities, this isn’t just a slight inconvenience; it impacts your entire day, how you can serve patients, and how your staff will have to pivot until the issue is resolved. For example, a healthcare facility in Marysville, CA, lost electronic health records of their entire facility for over a week after an HVAC unit burned out, resulting in outdated records that ultimately caused harm to patients who had delayed test results sent out. 

Preparing your facility through proactive and preventative maintenance helps your team feel confident moving forward with daily tasks without the worry of the impact an unresponsive machine would have on your facility. Using Intra and our Asset Logistics Workgroup, you can manage the lifecycle status of assets and KPIs such as mean time to repair and mean time between failure, ensuring that your assets are on optimized maintenance schedules through data and analytics. 

On top of time and money saved with proactive and preventative maintenance, there are specific asset management benefits for healthcare facilities that tie into the ability to care for patients as quickly and safely as possible. Courier and asset tracking workflows through platforms such as Intra are a fantastic solution for healthcare facilities, and investing now prevents potential harm down the road. For example, biopharmaceutical labs can safely transfer samples using our software by tracking the chain of custody using barcode scans. Our software even allows you to give direct delivery instructions to your internal couriers. This allows for minimal disruption to samples and significantly reduces the possibility of human error during sample transfer.

Prioritizing Patient Safety and Healthcare Compliance

One of the most prominent reasons to invest in healthcare facilities software relates to two of the most technical aspects of the field, compliance and security. We will harp on the importance of compliance for days, and if your healthcare facility doesn’t have a comprehensive compliance policy in place, you’re already behind. While healthcare facilities are generally more stringent on compliance practices, the overload of patients and understaffed facilities have resulted in oversights, which have cost healthcare facilities extraordinary amounts of money. According to Becker’s Hospital Review, they have noted recent cases of severe compliance repercussions, such as $792,000 in fines for six healthcare facilities for “failing to prevent unauthorized access to confidential patient information,” as well as a Boston hospital paying the U.S. government $1 million to settle allegations of document loss and HIPAA violation. These are only a few examples of how healthcare facilities lose money through oversights in compliance.

Compliance issues are present throughout the entirety of the healthcare system, and setting up a strong foundation is key for success. Will Hinde of West Monroe Partners’ healthcare practice states that “legacy systems are harder to protect and therefore could leave an organization and its IT systems more open to data security compliance risks or violations. The need is there to encrypt data at rest and secure connections, and not doing so can result in multimillion-dollar fines”. Thankfully, SCLogic’s Intra software was designed with security at the forefront, prioritizing secure design and integrations such as single sign-on (SSO) to prevent breaches caused by human error. 

Cybersecurity risks have proven to be a significant issue for healthcare facilities, and failing to secure your facility through modern software can have extensive repercussions. Just a few years ago, cloud software provider Blackbaud fell victim to a ransomware attack, impacting 100 organizations using their software and compromising 12.3 million patient records. Healthcare is one of the most highly targeted industries for cyberattacks, with hospitals representing 30% of large data breaches. Plus, more than 50% of the most used internet-connected hospital devices are vulnerable to cyberattacks. Securing your facility with updated software now will significantly decrease the likelihood of a cybersecurity breach, and risking your time is not worth the wait. 

Modernize Your FM Technology with SCLogic

When it comes to implementing new software, we know that the task can be daunting. Preparing for investment and overhaul of your current system is a significant step financially. However, what many healthcare facilities fail to realize is that working reactively in your facilities strategy is ultimately costing you more money and putting your team at risk for significant financial and legal repercussions. When you invest in SCLogic and our Intra platform, you are not just purchasing another run-of-the-mill software. You are provided with a team of experts whose primary job is to ensure that your team feels confident utilizing every aspect of our software and has access to technical support and training quickly and easily. Now is the time; let’s take your healthcare facility to the next level for you, your staff, and your patients’ well-being. Email [email protected] for more information about using Intra in healthcare settings or schedule a demo with one of our team members today.