Safety Innovations : Vital Signs Monitoring Leads to Increased Patient Safety and Workflow Efficiency

Methodist Specialty and Transplant Hospital in San Antonio cares for many high-acuity patients. Its busy, nationally recognized Texas Transplant Institute performs kidney, pancreas, and liver transplants. Its bariatric surgical center is a designated Center of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Excellence. The 275-bed, acute care hospital is known for its multispecialty surgical services, among other types of specialized care. Historically, the hospital had monitored bariatric patients with identified risk factors for deterioration, particularly sleep apnea, with pulse oximetry to measure oxygen saturation (SpO 2 ). Then, a planned upgrade of pulse oximeters turned into an unexpected opportunity to monitor all bariatric and transplant patients, as well as many other patients, comprehensively with continuous surveillance monitoring of all vital signs. This noninvasive wireless technology appealed to nurses, physicians, and executive leaders alike. That clinched the decision to make the switch. More than a year after the successful launch of continuous surveillance monitoring on its transplant unit and one medical-surgical unit, Methodist Specialty and Transplant Hospital began expanding the initiative to more medical-surgical units. The main reasons behind the decision to expand included enhanced patient safety, strong support from clinicians, patient satisfaction, and improvements in clinical workflow efficiency. Orchestrated as a test case for the ninehospital Methodist Healthcare system and its corporate affiliate, Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), the implementation paved the way for broader use of continuous surveillance monitoring across both systems.