Jersey City Medical Center Saves $2M By Using Mobile App

Jersey City (N.J.) Medical Center has announced it has saved $2 million in one year by implementing Practice Unite, a HIPAA-compliant smartphone messaging app, at its facility for staff to use.

Since deploying the Practice Unite staff communication app one year ago, the medical center has saved approximately $2 million through its app use. A portion of the medical center's savings came from faster patient discharge. The communication app saved the hospital $720,000 by improving communications in the observation unit, which allowed physicians to discharge patients 20 percent faster, according to the news release.

The app also allowed the medical center to reduce surgeon consult response time from two to four hours down to 15 to 30 minutes. This was due to the increased communication between physicians, nurses and other medical center staff, according to the news release.

Practice Unite was developed by Stuart Hochron, MD, who is a member of the medical staff at Jersey City Medical Center. "In designing Practice Unite, our focus has been to empower members of the care team by breaking down the communications and workflow barriers they face every day," said Dr. Hochron in the news release.

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