Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in London has found that digital wayfinding has improved both the patient and visitor experience, says Joe Fernandes, founder and CEO, BuzzStreets
Wayfinding is the communication of information that helps people navigate from one part of a physical space to another part. Poor wayfinding can be a drain on hospitals. The hospital managers I have spoken to, in both the UK and Portugal, estimate the cost each year, for each hospital, to be more than a million euros, and the time lost, in aggregate, to be months of person-hours.
When Wayfinding is working well it means:
- You know where you are
- You know where you want to be
- You have an effective route to your destination
- You easily recognise your destination when you reach it
- And you know how to find your way back
When visiting hospital, patients and their families are often in a raised state of anxiety, leading many to misjudge journey times and struggle with signage and on-wall maps. More than 85 per cent of patients ask for directions when they go to a hospital or other public health facility, and 30 per cent of first-time visitors get lost. (Source: Deloitte Digital)
Wayfinding systems can ease stress by providing easy-to-follow signage and legible directions. Currently, the navigational challenges presented by hospital sites are considerable as hospitals are often made up of multiple buildings that have usually been added to the original environment over time. Thus, moving among buildings can be tricky, and even the best static wayfinding systems can become undone by future decisions and actions (or inactions).
How technology is changing wayfinding
Global positioning systems are part of everyday life. Millions of people and vehicles are guided down roads and pavements every day by reliable digital navigation. It is an obvious next step to take this digital navigation indoors, enabling patients and other visitors to navigate from outside the hospital all the way to the specific location —whether that is a bed on a ward, a consulting room, the café, or the pharmacy. Essentially, technology can create a sat-nav for indoors, but unlike car sat-nav, the system is accurate to 1-2 metres as the ‘sensors’ are within the hospital (not 12,000 miles away in space).
One example is the BuzzStreets Wayfinding system, already being trialled in a number of hospitals including Chelsea and Westminster in London. It is part of the CW Innovation programme (a joint initiative between Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and its charity CW+) to test and scale innovations and digital systems that improve patient care and experience.
Chelsea and Westminster Hospital is a complex building with more than 6000 daily visitors, all with different needs at different times with different end locations. The app uses a system of Bluetooth low energy beacons, wi-fi signals, and the earth’s magnetic field to pinpoint the person’s location, giving them real-time directions, both spoken and visual, to allow them to navigate through the hospital, both horizontally and vertically. The app can personalise the route by choosing the fastest or the least busy route, and avoiding stairs if required.
The app also includes points of interest such as offices, cafeterias and, uniquely, more information about the Trust’s collection of more than 2000 works of art and digital installations that transform the hospital environment for patients, families, volunteers and staff.
“The BuzzStreets pilot project has already shown that the app reduces frustration for staff and visitors alike. It helps reduce the anxiety of patients and visitors trying to find their way in the hospital, which previously required contact with multiple different staff. Overall, we’ve seen that the app helps save resources, improves patient outcomes, and enhances the entire hospital experience for patients and their families,” says Vanessa Sloane, Deputy Chief Nurse at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.
Wayfinding helps staff too
Digital indoor navigation could also be a boon to staff. Research involving UK teaching hospitals looking at doctors’ expectations and experiences noted that many participants mentioned getting lost, with more than 50 per cent reporting becoming lost on the way to a crash call. These emergency situations mean staff are under time pressure and may be called to an unfamiliar ward. Thus when working on large sites, route optimisation should be a vital part of task prioritisation.
Similarly, one of a hospital’s many responsibilities is the daily safety management of patients with mental health problems and diseases (Parkinson, circumstantial or profound amnesia, Alzheimer’s, etc.) who may become lost within healthcare buildings during hospitalisation. A digital navigation system that allows these patients to be tracked, and assists staff who encounter them to aid them back to their ward, can help ensure these patients do not miss out on the care they need.
More than just A to B
The advantage of indoor navigation apps is that the system can be much more than a reliable way of moving around. Other services—such as appointments, examination results, general hospital information, spaces available in the parking areas—can also be incorporated into a single mobile application.
BuzzStreets includes features such as a communication system between patient and doctor, the possibility of scheduling appointments, receiving medical scans and prescriptions in the app, heat maps, contextual notification, updated and edited locations, appointment reminders, and multilingual voice guidance.
Additionally, the app allows for the collection of information to adapt the hospital to the flow of people who attend it, thus avoiding crowds of people in the same area. This data is also beneficial for facilities management: if a route is consistently busy or over-crowded, but another is always empty, steps can be taken to help change this either permanently or at specific times of day.
According to a 2019 survey, 97 per cent of respondents felt that their NHS room or ward (in England) was either very clean (69 per cent) or fairly clean (28 per cent) [Source: Statista]. A digital navigation system that gathers information about routes and traffic of patients and professionals can assist with a hospital’s cleaning and disinfection routines. This is achieved by identifying the areas of the hospital experiencing the highest levels of traffic, the type of traffic, and the dayparts where traffic is heaviest. Such information allows managers to organise cleaning staff efficiently and target areas requiring more frequent attention.
Digital wayfinding systems can also allow staff to trace equipment that is regularly moved around a hospital (e.g. wheelchairs) thus avoiding time wasted searching for them, or considering an item lost so a new one is ordered.
With this knowledge, it is much easier to ensure that the experience for everyone (staff, patients and visitors) is smoother, easier and more efficient. In turn, this information results in financial savings.
Conclusion
Many times each day, doctors, nurses and assistants are stopped (and therefore delayed) by visitors asking for directions, and patients are often late for appointments as they are lost within the hospital. With financial and resource management implications, digital indoor navigation is an important step forward in saving hospitals time and money.