Hi-Tech Hospitals Keep You Safe

PHOENIX, Ariz. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- More people die in hospitals on the weekends than on weekdays. You're less likely to die from a heart attack during the day than at night. These facts are from a study done by the American Medical Association. Hospital staffing could be one cause. That's why hospitals are now turning to hi-tech help to give doctors and nurses an extra set of eyes.

After Dean Murphy had a frightening arrhythmia, he wound up in ICU.

"Bingo, all of a sudden you go from good to very bad," Murphy told Ivanhoe.

Nurses like Mary Ann Marshall know they can't be with every patient every minute.

"As much as you want to be by the bedside constantly, you cannot," Marshall, who is an ICU registered nurse at Banner Health in Phoenix, told Ivanhoe. "It's impossible."

Now, someone's got her back.

An intensive care specialist monitors Murphy from a remote ICU center. Specialists monitor dozens of ICU patients in nine different hospitals, some hundreds of miles away.

In-room cameras let them do virtual rounds and even zoom in if something doesn't look right.

There's also an extra set of eyes at the hospital pharmacy. Cameras are a back-up for pharmacists. Each medicine is bar-coded and scanned. If something doesn't match up, a pharmacist is warned immediately.

"We take pictures of everything that the technician has used, so now, we have a second set of eyes with some pictures that we can see on the back end when the pharmacist checks," Troy Shirley, Pharm.D., directory of pharmacy at Dublin Methodist & Grady Memorial Hospitals in Dublin, Ohio, told Ivanhoe.

New "smart" beds are also making it safer for patients. Nurses are able to check on patients without being in the room. The bed also automatically weighs the patient while lying down.

How much difference can a trained pair of eyes make? In national studies, specialized intensive care staffing is associated with a 40-percent reduction in ICU mortality.

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Lara Lindsay

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