Vocera Communications, Inc., a provider of intelligent, real-time communication solutions for healthcare and other mission-critical mobile environments, today announced that the University of Chicago Medicine increased patient satisfaction and reduced readmissions only a few months after deploying the Vocera Care Rounds solution.

UChicago Medicine has sought to continually elevate its patient service at its world-renowned academic medical center, which employs nearly 10,000 faculty and staff. As part of an ongoing enterprise-wide commitment to patient communication and satisfaction, UChicago Medicine created an Office of Patient Experience, which identifies and deploys innovative models of care to improve patient, family and staff experience. Among the medical center's experience improvement strategies is a renewed focus on nurse leader rounding, supported by the Vocera Care Rounds solution.

"Vocera Care Rounds is a powerful tool that provides a system-wide way to track patient feedback and also recognize staff members who have provided superior care in real-time," said Sue Murphy, executive director of UChicago Medicine's Patient Experience and Engagement Program. "The solution was adopted quickly by our nurse leaders because it's easy, and it really makes a difference in patient satisfaction and outcomes."

Vocera Care Rounds is a patient experience solution as well as a robust data collection tool that standardizes the practice of rounding, enabling users to capture, address and manage patient feedback throughout a hospital stay. Prior to having tools like Vocera Care Rounds, hospitals typically used paper methods for rounding, which made it challenging to track patient requests and experience trends. Using the Vocera solution on iPad devices, nurse leaders have access to real-time, actionable data that allows them to conduct rounds more  efficiently, identify top performers among staff, get ahead of service issues and proactively pinpoint opportunities for improvement.

Within four months of implementing the Vocera solution, UChicago Medicine conducted nearly 12,000 rounds on more than 9,500 patients, yielding more than 2,800 positive staff recognitions. Surveys at the medical center showed patient satisfaction rose dramatically in the months following deployment of the redesigned rounding program, jumping 39 percentage points in Press Ganey's ratings for "Likelihood to Recommend," as well as an 8 percent improvement in overall hospital rating and 1.5 percent reduction in readmission rates.

In an effort to continue to improve patient experience across the entire care continuum, UChicago Medicine has deployed the Vocera Good to Go(R) solution that allows nurses to record patient discharge instructions at the bedside and the Vocera Care Calls solution to streamline and manage patient follow-up calls. Together, these solutions help improve compliance with the care plan and reduce avoidable readmissions.