Siemens Healthineers is already working closely with its partners but aims to broaden and deepen its relationships with healthcare providers globally to discover and translate new opportunities and possibilities in the healthcare system: to shape and realize efficient operations, advanced standards of care and sustainable business models.
Improving Acute Stroke Care
Helsinki University Hospital in Finland was looking for a way to improve acute stroke care and optimize patient outcomes without increasing costs. Together, the hospital and Siemens Healthineers analyzed processes and changed them to better connect the ambulance services with the emergency department and the latter with the neurological department. The CT system was moved to the emergency department, because short distances save precious time. Also, therapeutic analysis can be performed while the patient is still in the CT. That allowed them to significantly reduce the average door-to-needle time to 20 minutes and reduce the stroke mortality from 30 to 25 percent. Overall, this meant savings of €14.4 million in chronic care costs which made the installation of the neurological emergency department almost self-financing.
Lab Consolidation and Automation
National Health Service (NHS) Tayside in the UK was facing the challenge of integrating three labs into one and optimize the workflow. This meant the consolidation of formerly separated biochemistry, immunology, hematology, and hemostasis testing onto one single automation track. With a data-driven decision making and Siemens Healthineers’ consultative expertise the optimal track layout, the right mix of instruments, and the appropriate workflow could be determined. This allowed NHS to intelligently automate workflows in support of a lean, multidisciplinary laboratory that was then able to handle routine and emergency testing on one track. All of it was done without the need for additional staff, with a workload increase of 20 percent, and an improved turn-around time for add-on tests of 61 percent.
Turning CAPEX into OPEX
William Osler Health System (Osler) is one of Canada’s largest community hospitals, serving a population of more than 1.3 million people. They were aiming to cut costs while at the same time being able to continue to deliver the highest standard of care and better treatment results. Also, they were looking to replace aging and obsolete systems while not having the annual budget for it. For a contract time of 15 years, Siemens Healthineers will provide a comprehensive suite of management services for the majority of the medical imaging equipment throughout all hospital sites. The Managed Equipment Services (MES) contract includes procurement, replacement, and maintenance of more than 190 vendor-neutral diagnostic imaging equipment items for radiology and cardiology. In addition, financing and clinical solutions, professional services, room renovations, training for clinical users, and onsite technical support are covered. This allowed them to convert the costs for equipment purchases from capital expenditures (CAPEX) to operating expenses (OPEX).