Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh wins HIMSS Davies Award

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC has been named a 2015 HIMSS Enterprise Davies Award recipient.

The Davies Awards program promotes EHR-enabled improvement in patient outcomes through sharing of case studies and lessons learned across a wide range of efforts, including implementation strategies, workflow design, best practice development, adherence, and patient engagement that have improved care outcomes for patients.

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC was the first HIMSS Analytics Stage 7 pediatric hospital in the U.S. The facility moved into its current location in 2009 which was designed with input from physicians, nurses and families to ensure that patients receive care in a comfortable setting. 

The hospital has leveraged robust reporting from a state-of-the-art data warehouse to significantly reduce hospital-acquired infections. A variety of clinical data populates a dashboard to generate a pediatric Rothman Index, a real-time and an easy-to-understand composite score that evaluates the patient’s condition. Using this scoring and alert interface that works through both the EHR and a number of mobile devices, providers trigger early preventative measures to significantly reduce ICU admissions associated with pulmonary and cardiac events.

Children’s Hospital also uses IT including RFID technology, bar-coding, patient identification and system automation which have improved on-time medication delivery and reduced medication errors by 60 percent.

“As a pediatric hospital, Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC treats the most at-risk patients,” said Jonathan French, director of quality and patient safety at HIMSS North America. “Ensuring their patients receive the right treatment at the right time is paramount to successful treatment. Rather than trying to achieve static metrics, Children’s Hospital has a culture of learning and focus on constant improvement enabled through innovative data analytics and reporting capability. Those analytics are then used to launch programs that improve care delivery. The Davies Committee and HIMSS congratulate the team members of Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC on receiving the Davies Award in recognition of IT utilization to improve the health outcomes of the children of western Pennsylvania.”

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC will be recognized at the 2016 HIMSS Conference & Exhibition in Las Vegas later this month.

Beth Walsh,

Editor

Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.

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