Timely And Accurate Communications For Texas Institute For Surgery Staff
Customer
Texas Institute for Surgery
Industry
Healthcare
Location
Dallas, Texas
Number of Employees
200 +
Key Challenges
Hospital environments pose unique communication challenges. Clinical staff are rarely deskbound: they’re more likely to be in theatre, completing ward rounds, undertaking patient consultations, or in meetings.
Similarly, housekeeping crews and operational staff are on the move all day, with limited opportunities to access a computer. Jason Adams, Director of Information Technology at TIS, says: “Most staff do not have time to trawl through a load of emails and figure out what’s important or not. “If they’re in theatre, with their scrubs on, you can’t expect them to enter a password, and check emails to read an urgent message.”
Overhead announcements were highly intrusive – for staff and patients alike – and not always effective, particularly if staff were out of earshot.
Solution
TIS selected a range of SnapComms tools across the communication spectrum – from highly intrusive to more passive formats. These include pop-up alert notifications, on-screen tickers, survey, quiz, newsletter, screensaver and wallpaper.
Each of these channels meet a specific communication need. For example, SnapComms Alerts are the most impactful of all channels: they land straight onto the employee’s screen – mobile and desktop - bypassing email completely.
Adams says these are by far the most popular tool for urgent or important mass communications, and his first choice for publishing color-coded hospital alerts.
At the other end of the scale are passively-consumed channels - such as screensaver and wallpaper. These are perfect for driving reminder messages, and reinforcing positive behavior.
Given that most employees are equipped with mobiles, pushing content directly to these devices solved the problem of reaching those not sitting at a desk.
At the same time, leveraging the highly visible desktop screens, often shared by staff, presented an eye-catching way to broadcast important messages.
Application
Initially, TIS selected SnapComms to send compliance-related campaigns. “These will be focused on education – for example patient privacy – and will include excerpts from our compliance policies.
“The SnapComms channels are ideal for sending bitesize pieces of related content, published as a campaign over time,” says Adams.
While this project rolls out in the next 12 months, so impressed with the high impact of the channels, TIS has extended the use of SnapComms to other departments – with governance guidelines in place.
“What started out as a solution exclusively for publishing compliance topics has expanded into much wider usage.
The channels are extremely effective at getting messages in front of all staff,” says Adams, “although we only send Alerts for significant and valuable messages.
"Staff know this too, so it helps them prioritize what’s important.”
It was important for other TIS stakeholders to publish content without intervention from IT – saving valuable time and IT resources.
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