Yorkshire Ambulance Service Improves Patient Care, Reporting Efficiency and Carbon Footprint With Introduction of new Patient Transport Service technology

Yorkshire Ambulance Service has successfully implemented a pilot scheme across it Patient Transport Services (PTS).

The scheme, which saw the introduction of Talecom Wireless Delivered technology and CoPilot Live Professional over Motorola Solutions ES400 mobile computers, has seen improvements in patient care, reporting efficiency and the reduction in its carbon footprint as a result.
PTS crew performance is measured on the vehicle arrival time, departure and how long the patient spends in transit - all of these are monitored by the NHS board of commissioners.

Before the implementation of the new technology, reporting on the efficiency of the service was a manual process, as David Johnson, ICT Associate Director for YAS explains: "Previously, the PTS crews would pick up their paper log sheets along with their vehicle prior to working the day's shift. The log would list out in order the schedule of patient transportation and, as the day progresses, arrival and departure times would be hand written in by the crew, along with any specific data relating to the patient. Apart from occasional contact from the on-vehicle radio or a mobile call, the crew worked the shift, returning the completed job logs with the vehicle at the shift end."

With the exception of some crew members who used their own personal devices, none of the PTS vehicles were equipped with satellite navigation, leaving crew members to plan out their own daily routes. Measurement was limited to a spot check of 10% of the job sheets that would be manually input and analysed monthly to meet with NHS KPI criteria. This was proving to be a time consuming and inefficient method of measuring overall performance objectives. One of the main benefits of the new process is that it is helping YAS maintain accurate records as a KPI. In addition to an almost 100% record of arrival and departure of patients, real-time monitoring enables other KPIs such as the maximum length of time that a patient remains on board the PTS vehicle.

As David explains: "YAS covers a broad geographic area taking in both urban and rural locations. A PTS vehicle operating in Leeds can pick up five patients and be back at hospital within the designated two hour period.

In rural areas there is likely to be fewer patients on each journey but each patient is likely to spend longer on the vehicle. With the Talecom Wireless Delivered™ solution and CoPilot Live Professional over a Motorola Solutions ES400 mobile computer, we are looking to manage the PTS crew's workload more dynamically. Our objective is to do more patient pickups per PTS route while taking into account variables like the maximum amount of time the first patient has been on the vehicle."