Verhogen van de informatiewaarde van een dashboard voor een spoedgevallendienst

Abstract

Aim: This study discusses the development of a generic dashboard providing real-time information on the status of the ED and its patients. Methods: The research is structured following the principles of design science research (DSR). A literature review is performed to gain a deeper understanding in the current use of ED dashboards and to discover the limitations of the existing dashboards. The requirements for the dashboard were formulated based on the results of a focus group and the findings of a literature review. Results: A dashboard is developed providing real-time information at both the overall level of the ED and at the level of individual patients. Moreover, it also includes four universally accepted crowding measures. The dashboard is demonstrated using a test dataset for Belgian Eds and fulfils all the requirements. Discussion: The dashboard is an improvement on the existing dashboards because its use is not limited to one specific ED. It improves situation awareness of the care providers by presenting real-time information at patient-level and at the level of the ED. The dashboard also provides information on the physical location of the patients in the ED and on the stage of the care process in which the patients are situated. Conclusion: The developed dashboard provides real-time information on the status of the ED enhanced with drill-down functionalities to follow the cases of individual patients.