St Helens and Knowsley launches System C vitals in ‘big bang’ go-live

St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust has celebrated a successful go-live of System C’s CareFlow Vitals as part of its strategy of becoming a digital exemplar trust.

The roll-out of CareFlow Vitals represented the first time System C’s e-observations (e-obs) software had been deployed across all inpatient services using a ‘big bang’ approach, which happened in the space of one day and involved simultaneously replacing an existing e-obs system.

The trust is using a range of Vitals assessments covering sepsis, dementia and delirium, carbapenemase producing enterobacteriaceae (CPE), falls, fluid balance, indwelling devices, malnutrition universal screening tools (MUST), smoking and alcohol.

The new solution from System C introduces NEWS2 screening, which means all patients are assessed using the latest version of the National Early Warning Score (NEWS) model.

CareFlow Vitals also provides clinicians with detailed clinical information on the move and an overview of care delivery as it happens.

Mick Heaton, EPR programme manager at St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, called the latest deployment “a massive achievement”.

“Delivering this size of implementation successfully in such a tight timescale was made possible by excellent partnership working between System C, clinical staff and the informatics team,” said Heaton.

The go-live of System C’s Vitals tech is latest in a series of deployments following the launch of the supplier’s Medway patient administration system and electronic patient record 15 months ago.

In June, St Helens went live with Graphnet’s shared care record as part its St Helens Care programme, designed to deliver improved, joined up health and care services to residents of the Merseyside town.

Staff at St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals, GPs, community and mental health workers and the council’s social care teams are now sharing health and care records on the borough’s 178,500 residents.

The digitisation programme is already having a positive impact, providing all staff involved in a patient’s treatment and care access to necessary information.

Other milestones include the deployment of CP-IS capabilities – a national information sharing project between health and social care staff to better protect vulnerable children.

Read more:

• St Helens Care goes live with Graphnet shared records system
• Walsall Healthcare switches to System C in IT shake-up
• The CIO interview: Christine Walters, St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust