Kages project

An end to bureaucracy: what hospitals are planning

Less bureaucracy for doctors means more time for patients

(Bild: Vagner Castro - stock.adobe.com)

 How can excessive documentation be simplified and time-consuming administration in Styrian hospitals be streamlined? All Kages employees asked themselves this question in a project that ran until the end of the year. Here you can read about the reports that came in and how more time is to be left for patients. 

Pen and form, then stethoscope and blood pressure monitor: Styrian hospital doctors and nursing staff often have to overcome time-consuming bureaucratic hurdles before they can devote themselves to their patients. In many cases, this not only causes stress due to the additional workload, but also dissatisfaction - on both sides. Detailed documentation in medical professions is essential, not least for legal reasons. Nevertheless, many doctors complain that they are spending more and more time at their desks instead of in the treatment room.

"It's about taking the pressure off our employees"
Last year, Kages therefore launched the "Too much documentation" project as one of the recipes against too much paperwork in the white-green hospitals: staff from all areas and locations were called upon to report where the bureaucracy was getting in the way. "The aim is to relieve our employees and make processes more efficient. Their expertise and know-how will be used to reduce bureaucracy," Ulf Drabek, Chief Financial and Technical Officer, told the Krone.

Kages is pushing innovation and process optimization in order to relieve employees and make processes more efficient.

Ulf Drabek, Kages-Vorstand für Finanzen und Technik

165 reports received
And the mailbox of the coordination office in Graz filled up steadily from the first day of the initiative - by the end of December, the planned closing date, 165 reports had been received. They concerned "suggestions for improvement to streamline and optimize documentation" and came from all hospitals, most of them from the operational area: nursing was in the lead with 75 suggestions, followed by doctors with 64 contributions and 18 from administration. The remaining reports came from the medical-technical and controlling departments. 

Ulf Drabek

(Bild: Christian Jauschowetz)

"The focus was on patient and nursing documentation, the handling of electronic fever charts and the handling of information sheets," reports the hospital company. However, "potential for improvement" was also identified in terms of administrative systems. Some employees also complained that administrative processes were too time-consuming, although this was due to legal requirements and therefore beyond the hospitals' control.

The good news: more than half of the suggestions already have a "Done" tick under them, and experts are already working on the remaining to-do tasks in ongoing projects.

"Round-the-clock writing support would be desirable"
What is an example of more efficiency in everyday hospital life? "The secretaries usually support the doctors until 7 p.m., round-the-clock typing support would be desirable," reads one of the messages. The solution was quickly found: End-to-end typing assistance already exists in the form of speech recognition in all documents in the patient system.

Another problem: when being admitted for inpatient stays, patients have to enter their details up to three times - to the medical staff, nursing staff and administration. Now the simplification: an automatic data transfer is coming.

Gesundheitslandesrat Karlheinz Kornhäusl:

„Verschlankte Administration als Mosaiksteinchen für kürzere OP-Wartezeiten“

Karlheinz Kornhäusl in conversation with the "Krone". In the background: an "art installation" in his office with a locker from the former pre-clinic and a doctor's coat.

(Bild: Land Steiermark)

"If a nurse takes longer to complete the documentation than the nursing step itself, something is wrong!", Karlheinz Kornhäusl makes clear in the "Krone" interview. The regional health councillor was a doctor himself for many years, most recently "operating" as an internist at Graz LKH West. And he has experienced "excessive bureaucracy" himself, as he says. "In many conversations I've had, staff have said to me: 'The documentation and administration are overwhelming us'," says the ÖVP politician. 

"Less time on the computer!"
Together with Kages, he is now asking himself the question: how can we reduce the workload of doctors and nurses while still complying with the legal framework? Patients should also benefit from the streamlining of administrative processes in Styrian hospitals - "less time on the computer means more time for treatment!"

According to Kornhäusl, optimized administration also plays "a role as a piece in the mosaic" for shorter surgery waiting times. The project is currently running at full speed and the first results should be available in June.