University of Chicago Medicine Uses Vocera Care Rounds Solution to Improve Patient Experience

SAN JOSE, Calif., April 7, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Vocera Communications, Inc. (NYSE:VCRA), the leading provider of intelligent, real-time communication solutions for healthcare and other mission-critical mobile environments, today announced that the University of Chicago Medicine increased patient satisfaction and reduced readmissions only a few months after deploying the Vocera Care Rounds solution.

UChicago Medicine has sought to continually elevate its patient service at its world-renowned academic medical center, which employs nearly10,000 faculty and staff. As part of an ongoing enterprise-wide commitment to patient communication and satisfaction, UChicago Medicine created an Office of Patient Experience, which identifies and deploys innovative models of care to improve patient, family and staff experience. Among the medical center's experience improvement strategies is a renewed focus on nurse leader rounding, supported by the Vocera Care Rounds solution.

"Vocera Care Rounds is a powerful tool that provides a system-wide way to track patient feedback and also recognize staff members who have provided superior care in real-time," said Sue Murphy, executive director of UChicago Medicine's Patient Experience and Engagement Program. "The solution was adopted quickly by our nurse leaders because it's easy, and it really makes a difference in patient satisfaction and outcomes."

Vocera Care Rounds is a patient experience solution as well as a robust data collection tool that standardizes the practice of rounding, enabling users to capture, address and manage patient feedback throughout a hospital stay. Prior to having tools like Vocera Care Rounds, hospitals typically used paper methods for rounding, which made it challenging to track patient requests and experience trends. Using the Vocera solution on iPad devices, nurse leaders have access to real-time, actionable data that allows them to conduct rounds more efficiently, identify top performers among staff, get ahead of service issues and proactively pinpoint opportunities for improvement.

Within four months of implementing the Vocera solution, UChicago Medicine conducted nearly 12,000 rounds on more than 9,500 patients, yielding more than 2,800 positive staff recognitions. Surveys at the medical center showed patient satisfaction rose dramatically in the months following deployment of the redesigned rounding program, jumping 39 percentage points in Press Ganey's ratings for "Likelihood to Recommend," as well as an 8 percent improvement in overall hospital rating and 1.5 percent reduction in readmission rates.

In an effort to continue to improve patient experience across the entire care continuum, UChicago Medicine has deployed the Vocera Good to Go(R) solution that allows nurses to record patient discharge instructions at the bedside and the Vocera Care Calls solution to streamline and manage patient follow-up calls. Together, these solutions help improve compliance with the care plan and reduce avoidable readmissions.

UChicago Medicine's work on elevating the patient experience will be recognized by the Intelligent Hospital Association (IHA) at HIMSS15, a gathering in Chicago of more than 38,000 healthcare IT professionals.

The association will present the "2015 Improving the Patient Experience: Care and Safety Award" to the medical center at 5 p.m. CT on April 13 at the IHA Pavilion at McCormick Place, Booth #6656. In addition, Murphy will share details of UChicago Medicine's experience-improvement strategy during her presentation, "Transforming Patient Experience Using Care Rounding," on April 14.

For more information about Vocera solutions, visit Booth #2012 at HIMSS, or go to www.vocera.com.

About The University of Chicago

The University of Chicago Medicine has been at the forefront of medical care since 1927. Located in historic Hyde Park on the South Side of Chicago, the medical campus has 568 licensed beds and includes the Center for Care and Discovery, Comer Children's Hospital, Bernard A.

Mitchell Hospital for adult inpatient care, and the Duchossois Center for Advanced Medicine. The University of Chicago Medicine also has outpatient locations throughout the Chicago area. University of Chicago Medicine physicians are members of the University of Chicago Physicians Group, which includes more than 700 physicians and covers the full array of medical and surgical specialties.

About Vocera

Vocera Communications, Inc. (NYSE:VCRA) empowers teams through intelligent, real-time communication and collaboration in healthcare, hospitality, energy, and other mission-critical mobile environments.

Widely recognized for developing smarter ways to communicate, Vocera offers enterprise-class technologies that enable collaboration for mobile teams on their device of choice. Vocera solutions are installed in more than 1,200 organizations worldwide, improving efficiency, quality, safety and outcomes while creating optimal working and healing environments. Via the company's research collaborative, the Experience Innovation Network, Vocera also drives thought leadership for the healthcare industry and new standards in care delivery to elevate patient, family, nurse and physician experiences. Vocera is headquartered in San Jose, California, with offices in San Francisco, Tennessee, Canada, India, United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.

For more information, visit www.vocera.com and @VoceraComm on Twitter.