Proventix Helps Princeton Baptist Earn National Recognition for Handwashing Technology

Birmingham-based Proventix Systems, Inc. today celebrates with Princeton Baptist Medical Center, also of Birmingham, for the national recognition they received from HIMSS/ASQ for successful adoption of information technology to improve quality. Princeton Baptist was chosen from hundreds as one of two national HIMSS/ASQ Stories of Success for the 22 percent reduction in healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) resulting from their adoption of Proventix's nGage Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) based hand hygiene monitoring system.

The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) and the American Society for Quality (ASQ) annually choose award recipients based on "outstanding accomplishments in the adoption and use of information technology to achieve improved patient safety, quality, effectiveness and efficiency."

Princeton Baptist Medical Center is being featured as a "Tier 1" organization, whose story demonstrates how technology helps support the six priorities of the National Priorities Partnership and the Joint Commission's national patient safety goals and priorities.

The nGage system monitors hand hygiene compliance 24 hours a day, 7 days week. Healthcare workers wear badges that are uniquely recognized by control units at soap dispensers throughout the hospital. When the worker enters a room or area where there is a control unit, they are recognized and, upon the completion of a quality hand hygiene event, they are given important, patient-specific information (such as "the patient is at risk for a fall"), general employee information, or employee-specific information (such as stock market reports or sports scores). The messaging creates incentives for healthcare workers at the point of care, improves workflow and creates opportunities for efficiencies while enhancing patient safety and quality of care.

"The information gathered in these case studies will help the industry understand how valuable health IT as a tool can be to improving patient safety and quality," says David A. Collins, MHA, CPHQ, CPHIMS, FHIMSS, who is HIMSS director, healthcare information systems. "By sharing notable quality improvement outcomes, we hope these innovative examples will serve as guidance to others for improved healthcare delivery and demonstrate the benefits of health IT adoption."

Healthcare regulatory agencies identify hand hygiene as the single most important way to reduce infection risk, but high levels of sustained hand hygiene compliance are elusive in healthcare facilities around the world. With nGage, Proventix responded to the call from world leader in agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Joint Commission and the World Health Organization for a new science in quality and safety monitoring technology.

"Proventix and nGage are part of a bigger vision than merely improving hand hygiene," says Proventix CEO, Harvey Nix. "Great minds in clinical quality, such as Dr. Peter Pronovost, author of Safe Patients, Smart Hospitals: How One Doctor's Checklist Can Help Us Change Health Care from the Inside Out, and Atul Gawande , author of The Checklist Manifesto and Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance, have demonstrated that improved quality outcomes are possible in healthcare. The opportunity exists to improve delivery of care through collaboration among healthcare workers and standardized processes. nGage has seized this opportunity by utilizing RFID based wireless technology to monitor, communicate, improve and transform healthcare."

In addition to hand hygiene monitoring, Proventix is exploring other capabilities of nGage to monitor other quality events.