New Crosscare system to increase time care staff spend with patients and reduce paper records

St Raphael’s Hospice in Sutton, Greater London, plans to start using new clinical management software, Crosscare, to help increase the amount of time care staff spend with patients and reduce the time spent doing paperwork.

Crosscare is the leading clinical management system, created by Advanced Health and will allow the hospice to improve patient data accuracy, reduce paperwork and enable more time to be spent with patients.

Mike Roycroft, chief executive of St Raphael’s, said: “Crosscare is becoming the ‘de-facto’ clinical management system for hospices across the country. We visited several hospices that were using the system and all of the staff were positive about the way it worked and the benefits it had delivered, leaving us in little doubt that this was the right system to choose.

“I also have previous experiences of using Advanced’s solutions, so I knew we would be working with quality software and experts in the field.”

Crosscare was selected by the hospice due to its comprehensive functionality, its ability to interface with other NHS systems via the Medical Interoperability Gateway (MIG) and its popularity within the hospice sector.

Staff at St Raphael’s will begin using the innovative new system from November 2015 across all care departments and will replace existing paper-based processes, enabling staff to update online patient records with consultations, assessments and drug administration details.

Mr Roycroft commented: “We anticipate that within 18 months of implementing the software we will have dramatically reduced our reliance upon use of patients’ paper records. It is paramount that staff are working with an up to date web-based system that can be updated instantly and is accessible to everyone, and Crosscare will provide that.

“Recording assessment results and episodes in patients’ pathways onto an online care plan will allow us to be more responsive to people’s needs and more effective. By reducing bureaucracy, Crosscare will enable staff to have more time to deliver care, which is at the heart of what a hospice does.”

Following the implementation of the core system, St Raphael’s aims to introduce ‘Crosscare Mobile’, to enable hospice teams to access and update patient records whilst visiting patients.

Mr Roycroft, added: “Working within a care sector involves multi-disciplinary teams. A system like Crosscare is fundamental to integrating these different groups and ensuring everyone has access to the same high quality information to deliver more effective care.”

St Raphael’s Hospice is a voluntary organisation providing palliative care to over 1,000 patients every year.