Caso de Sucesso

THE CHU CHARLEROI USES A SYSTEM FOR MANAGING QUALITY INDICATORS AND MONITORING INFECTIONS IN THE ICU

Background

The general hospital CHU Charleroi is situated in Charleroi and offers about 1,400 beds and 6 intensive care units with about 54 beds.
Inaugurated in 2014, the hospital has started the process for obtaining the French HAS accreditation (French National Authority for Health).
Before joining the MICA – Monitoring Intensive Care Activities project, the hospital used a system based on an Excel spreadsheet to monitor its indicators, with very limited data, including admission date and diagnosis.
In addition, the system used for monitoring patient flow only showed the situation of the unit once a day. Patients registered after the daily update did not show in the records until the next update.
Another sensitive issue identified was the delay in the service’s epidemiological data results, making it difficult to monitor hospital-acquired infections and prevention strategies.

Solution

By joining the MICA project, the CHU Charleroi was able to use the Epimed Monitor ICU system to manage its clinical indicators and severe acute respiratory infections (SARIs).

Results

The features offered by the Epimed Monitor ICU system allowed the hospital to better map the clinical and epidemiological profile of the intensive care unit, which reliably reflects the profile of the unit and enables the fast and real-time identification of the number of hospital patients in intensive care units.

According to Dr Biston, knowledge of the patient flow, the occupancy rate and length of hospital stay has improved considerably.
After the system was implemented, nearly 500 patients that the internal system had not detected were found.

The Epimed Monitor Surveillance and infection monitoring system at the ICU, also used by the CHU Charleroi, has improved the monitoring of infections and the control of epidemics.

‘‘Last year, we had a localised outbreak of invasive aspergillosis. I was able to easily track affected  patients and their diagnoses in the Epimed Monitor Surveillance system. Before, we had to see each patient separately, but now thanks to Epimed we are able to immediately diagnose 10 cases.”, Dr Biston explains.

I open the Epimed Monitor ICU at least once a week to generate reports and see the results. Each year, I present the results and now I use Epimed online and in real-time, especially when there are any issues. Everything is clearer and better organised than before.

Dr Patrick Biston

Testimonials

According to Dr Biston, one of the key advantages of the Epimed Monitor system is that the software is simple and can monitor information and generate reports in real-time. ‘‘Before, I prepared the statistics once a month, which took me 3 to 4 whole days of work. Now, with the Epimed Monitor system everything is ready and I can prepare my reports whenever I want. ’’

Dr Biston monitors the indicators on a weekly basis and says that the ease of information retrieval helps him identify risks quickly and make decisions.

“Sometimes I warn the department of microbiology about certain cases”, he says.