Allocade, Inc. is a healthcare software technology company located in Menlo Park, Calif. The company was founded in 2004 to solve one of healthcare’s most pressing problems: patient flow optimization.
Allocade provides an enterprise-wide patient flow solution. The company’s On-Cue software is an innovative solution that addresses the lifelong challenge of hospitals’ uncontrollable variability. On-Cue uses an Artificial Intelligence Engine to reallocate hospital resources in real-time as conditions change.
The company’s management team includes former top executives from the NASA Ames Research Center, Siemens Medical Systems, Philips Medical Systems, Winster, Acuson Corporation, Sierra OnLine, Stentor and Inzap.
The Current Problem
Hospitals operate in an environment of inevitable change. Inpatients, outpatients and emergency patients vie for resources, and procedure requests arrive at unpredictable and unplanned times. In addition, clinical procedure lengths vary along with the need to correctly time and coordinate patient prep before procedures. As a result, hourly and daily schedules are significantly altered and schedules throughout other departments within the enterprise are impacted.
Efficient patient flow is the key to hospital profitability. Millions of dollars are spent by hospitals on healthcare IT solutions, yet there is no technology powerful and smart enough to automatically optimize patient flow. In the end, hospital staff still manage their daily challenges and changes by using “old world” methods including pencil, paper, whiteboards, faxes, pagers, as well as spending significant time on the telephone. As a result, hospitals today are often under-using their available capacity; therefore, missing revenue opportunities and paying for unnecessary overtime.
In the past, hospitals were losing outpatients to other facilities because of the long wait times. However, with the recent changes in the Health Care Reform Act, greater demand will be placed on hospital outpatient volumes, creating even longer wait times. All of this significantly affects the bottom line within an industry with high fixed costs and very thin margins.
Allocade’s On-Cue software solution optimizes hospital patient flow for inpatients, outpatients and emergency patients by using technology developed to manage workflow on the Hubble Space Telescope. On-Cue is powered by an Artificial Intelligence Engine that reallocates resources in real-time as conditions change. The core of the On-Cue technology was conceived by Don Rosenthal, founder and chief technology officer of Allocade. At NASA, Rosenthal led the Artificial Intelligence Applications Group in the NASA Ames Research Center where he was responsible for the dynamic rescheduling software that optimally utilized the limited resources on the Hubble Space telescope.
The On-Cue software system leverages the information already available in Hospital Information Systems (HIS), Radiology Information Systems (RIS) and Electronic Medical Record Systems (EMR).
There are two main components that make up On-Cue:
• Smart Optimization
Powered by its Artificial Intelligence Engine, On-Cue reallocates resources in real-time as conditions change. It calculates actual patient procedure start times and helps staff to better manage the constant and unpredictable disruptions to their workflow.
• Smart Communication
On-Cue enables quick and easy time-tagged electronic communication and visibility between clinical areas, patient areas and patient transport. As a result, there is real-time communication enterprise-wide between caregivers and a full audit trail of all communications.
Allocade began shipping the On-Cue software solution in January of 2008. Since the first installation of the software solution, customers have noted a considerable decrease in time spent on procedure coordination, preparation tasks and overall phone time. In addition, customers report a reduction in exam backlog, decreased staff overtime and increased capacity, which translates into a significant return on investment.
The On-Cue software reduces the probability of hand-off mistakes, lost and misplaced orders, and it saves time that was previously lost gathering printed orders. It also eliminates the need to transcribe order information onto whiteboards and constant phone calls to coordinate prep tasks or transport patients. As a result, hospital staff has more time for direct clinical care.
The company initially introduced On-Cue to the diagnostic imaging department, nursing floors and the emergency department. The capabilities of the solution are now being expanded in additional areas including surgery and cardiology.
