Finding the ‘Centerpiece’ for a Smarter Patient Room

Write-back functionality allows clinicians to type or speak care notes for real-time syncing with Epic, so they don’t have to wait to put those notes into a computer. “Whatever we can do to take away barriers that pull nurses away from patient care is always a win,” Foust-Cofield says.

For patients, having ready access to information about their care helps to alleviate anxiety and increase transparency. “The physician can pull up lab work and other results on the whiteboard and review that with the patient in real time,” Foust-Cofield adds.

To protect patient privacy, Reid clinicians must badge in to the whiteboard for it to display HIPAA-protected information, she says.

The potential to streamline communication is a critical benefit of digitized tools in patient rooms, according to Jill Seys, a digital health strategist with the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society. Manual communication methods — such as dry-erase boards, written orders or electronic communications not visible within the workflow — introduce delays and heighten the risk of discrepancies as information is exchanged, she says.

With smart room technologies generally, Seys adds, “there’s a real opportunity to enhance the workflow and augment effective team communication.”

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Interactive Displays for Real-Time, Personalized Updates

In Boston, Brigham and Women’s Hospital collaborated with vendors in 2021 to see how digital whiteboards affected patients’ emergency department experiences. Their study involved 50 patients who had whiteboards and 50 patients who did not. The displays included essential information, such as the status of lab tests and whether patients were considered a fall risk.

Overwhelmingly, patients preferred the whiteboards, saying they felt more informed about their care and better prepared for discharge.

Dr. Peter Chai, who led the study, is an emergency physician and associate professor of emergency medicine at Brigham and Women’s. He notes that in the ED’s chaotic, unpredictable environment, patient communication can be challenging.

“A lot of times, patients are kept in the dark, mostly because we as clinicians are also in the dark about what kind of imaging studies they’re going to get or who will see them,” Chai says. “We see this whiteboard as a strategy to update patients in real time and provide them with more knowledge and guidance about what’s happening.”

At Geisinger Health System in northeastern Pennsylvania, these interactive screens serve as “family engagement centers” providing information and entertainment, says Vice President of Digital Transformation Rebecca Stametz. Small touches, such as relaxation content and white noise for sleeping, elevate the quality of the patient experience.

Geisinger’s smart displays also provide information that includes real-time care team identification, daily goals, mobility progress and predischarge education.

“We want to prepare patients for when they leave the hospital so that they feel comfortable at home and have what they need,” Stametz says. “We can provide that personalized education at the right moment through this centralized hub.”

Since an initial deployment of 100 whiteboards in 2022, Geisinger has installed an additional 300 whiteboards and plans to add 100 more by year’s end. In surveys measuring the impact of the displays, nearly 90% of patients said they would recommend the digital whiteboard experience, Stametz says.

At Reid Health, integrating the screens with the EHR, picture archiving and communication systems and other tools has “dramatically improved” patient communication, Foust-Cofield says.

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Less Time on Admin, More Time for Patients

Empowering patients to access information and self-service tasks via the interactive displays can make a significant difference for nurses. At Brigham and Women’s Hospital ED, whiteboards gave patients status updates to both alleviate their anxiety and free up clinical staff.

“We tried to design this in a way that would proactively address a lot of the questions that patients come to us for,” Chai says.

At Reid Health, self-service food ordering is one of the whiteboard’s most popular features, Foust-Cofield says. Now, nurses no longer have to spend 20 minutes placing an order.

Smart room technologies are part of Reid Health’s strategy for attracting and retaining clinical talent, she adds. When new graduates compare prospective employers, they notice whether an organization is using tools that simplify clinical workflows.

“This investment clearly sends a message to clinicians that we are committed to decreasing that burden on our first-line staff, so I think it speaks volumes,” she says.

Smarter Screens for the Next Patient Rooms

In the near term, Reid Health’s smart displays will support ambient listening to facilitate real-time care documentation that goes directly into Epic, Foust-Cofield says.

“My goal is for the nurse to be able to ‘nurse out loud’ as they’re assessing the patient,” she says.

At Geisinger, future enhancements include increased personalization and expanded self-service capabilities, Stametz says.

“That’s a big theme for us as we look at that smart room of the future — being as transparent as we can with the data that we have but also putting a lot of power at the fingertips of the patient and family,” she says.

Implemented thoughtfully, smart room technologies can enhance the patient experience, Seys notes.

“Patients come to us at some of the most vulnerable moments in their lives,” she says. “There’s a real opportunity here to use digital tools to enhance patient care. When we reduce the worry caused by fragmented systems and improve team communication, we don’t just mitigate risk, we ease the unseen burdens patients carry. In doing so, we elevate the patient experience in ways they may never consciously notice but will deeply feel.”