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Press release
High-tech OR a bad investment?
Expert demands better planning and staff training
Düsseldorf, October 2016 – More and more hospitals in Germany are
modernizing their operating rooms. These so-called “Hybrid ORs”
enhance the workplace of a surgeon with imaging techniques such as
angiography and computer tomography and sometimes even provide a
robotic assistance system. This “high-tech” equipment, however, can
quickly become a bad investment if the personnel are not able to use it
due to a lack of training, stresses an expert in the run-up to the MEDICA
EDUCATION CONFERENCE 2016 taking place between November 14 and
17 in Düsseldorf.
Today, many operations are performed in “minimally invasive” procedures. A
surgeon removes the gall bladder is using small openings in the abdominal wall.
Controlled by a surgeon working in an adjoining room, a robot assist in prostate
surgery. Heart surgeons repair valves via a catheter in the inguinal artery.
Vascular surgeons implant complex vessel prostheses using catheter
procedures also via the inguinal artery. These interventions require high-quality
equipment including “high-end” devices that in the past could only be afforded
by large university hospitals.
Now, mid-sized and small hospitals also have high-tech operation rooms.
Professor Dr. med. Clemens Bulitta, who manages the Institute for Medical
Technology at the Eastern Bavarian Amberg-Weiden University, estimates that
more than 200 hospitals in Germany have a hybrid operating room. In smaller
hospitals, there is usually enough money for just one unit. Vascular surgeon,
neurosurgeon, traumatologist, oral and maxillofacial surgeon, urologist and
general surgeon: they all must share the room. Everyone brings in his/her own
demands and devices. “The interdisciplinary use increases the complexity in the
project”, says Professor Bulitta. Even planning becomes a challenge.
For this reason, hospitals should invest enough time and effort so that in the
end the hybrid OR meets the requirements of all users. Professor Bulitta
explains: “We recommend a single ‘master plan’ that is oriented based on the
hospital's workflow and considers all groups such as medical technology,
technical building equipment and building.” Building information modeling, which
runs through all steps on the computer, improves planning but is not yet
standard. In practice, visualization of the 2D plans in 3D helps best at present.
All relevant interest groups should be fully involved into the planning process.
For small hospitals, a hybrid OR is associated with enormous investment costs
that can only pay off with optimal utilization. According to Professor Bulitta´s
experience, this can only be achieved when the personnel is appropriately
trained. “Many hospitals think only of investment and operating costs but forget
the qualification costs for the personnel”, says the expert. It is not only the
high-tech devices that are challenging to operate. Professor Bulitta explains:
“Personnel must know the basics of modern imaging and post-processing, the
options for radiation protection, patient positioning and how to organize ordering
and storage of interventional materials.” To this list must be added knowledge of
material and device sciences as well as the required basic knowledge of the
medical aspects of the procedures. “Due to the challenges in interdisciplinary
cooperation, specific communication training also makes sense”, adds the
expert.
If personnel are not adequately trained, many scheduled operations may not be
able to be performed later. “In the worst case, the hybrid OR is filled with
unused high-tech toys”, warns Professor Bulitta. As a result, it is not only the
patient who suffers when deprived of optimal treatment. The hybrid OR could
become an expensive investment disaster for the hospital as well. According to
Prof. Bulitta, this situation can only be avoided when the high-tech OR is
planned from the beginning as an overall system with the personnel working
within. The expert addresses this notion of optimal planning in the symposium
“Hospital engineering: Workflow-driven hospital and clinical engineering” on the
fourth conference day of the MEDICA EDUCATION CONFERENCE 2016.
***Please ask for a specimen copy if you wish to print.***
Advance notification
MEDICA EDUCATION CONFERENCE, theme day Diagnostics in Internal
Medicine, Laboratory Medicine, Toxicology and Hygiene
Symposium Hospital engineering: Workflow-driven hospital and clinical
engineering,
Thursday, November 17, 2016, between 02.10 pm and 03.30 pm
Chair: Prof. Dr. Clemens Bulitta, Weiden
Leading the next wave of innovation – architectural concepts and requirements
Dipl.-Ing. Architect Johannes Kresimon, Düsseldorf
Workflow challenges in the OR of the future – a systems engineering approach
Prof. Dr. Clemens Bulitta, Weiden
ICU of the future
Andreas Faltlhauser, DEAA, Weiden
Press contact for inquiries:
Press office DGIM/MEDICA EDUCATION CONFERENCE
Anne-Katrin Döbler/Stephanie Priester
PO BOX 30 1 20
70451 Stuttgart
Phone: 0711 8931-605
Fax: 0711 8931-167
Email:[email protected]
Messe Düsseldorf GmbH
Press office MEDICA 2016
Martin-Ulf Koch/ Larissa Browa
Phone: +49(0)211-4560-444/ -549
FAX: +49(0)211-4560-8548
Email: [email protected]