Nashville, Tenn.-based HCA Healthcare is rolling out an AI-powered nurse handoff tool to about 100 of its 189 hospitals over the next two months, its fastest technology rollout to date, Executive Vice President and Chief Clinical Officer Michael Schlosser, MD, told Becker’s at the 14th Annual CEO+CFO Roundtable.
The tool, developed with Google, is expanding to eight of HCA Healthcare’s divisions after pilots in two divisions, where it is already live. The rollout will give tens of thousands of nurses access to the tool, Dr. Schlosser said. In earlier testing at one HCA Healthcare hospital, nurses rated the tool 86% accurate and 90% helpful.
In the pilots, the tool saved nurses time on handoffs at the end of 12-hour shifts. HCA Healthcare also tracked handoff-related safety events and near misses through its patient safety system, and those “basically have gone to zero in our pilot sites,” Dr. Schlosser said.
Nurses also reported feeling more prepared for their shifts and more confident, he said.
“We know handoff is a high-risk period in any care delivery setting,” Dr. Schlosser said. “The data showing that, at this point, we’ve close to eliminated handoff as a safety risk for our inpatient care teams is pretty impactful.”
