Workflow orchestration: moving beyond analytics

Today, UH uses the analytics dashboard for a variety of purposes. They track weekly volumes by modality and site to identify where workloads are too heavy, and if action is needed. Rosipko points out that the dashboard has been valuable during the COVID-19 pandemic, as volumes have been constantly changing. They also plan to use the dashboard as an alarm tool if certain service level agreements (SLAs) risk not being met. “It guides the radiologists to select the exams with the highest priority, based both on the clinical status, the current workload as well as the SLA restrictions,” describes Rosipko.

The informatics team has also created views to understand reading patterns among various subspecialties. Rosipko explains that the health network includes several community hospitals as well as academic centers, and the analytics dashboard has helped them to understand who is reading which kinds of studies and how to identify areas of improvements. “The most complex exams might be better read by the academic hospitals,” she says.

Rosipko highlights the value of creating tailored views of the dashboard. As an example, she explains that they have created one view to monitor and keep track of all CT head exams, and one for all lung cancer screening exams. “Each section has a radiologist in charge, and they have access to a personalized configured view to keep track of their area. This brings tremendous value since they can quickly identify if certain studies should be rerouted to other sites to balance workflows and meet specific SLAs.”

The tech QA tool for continuous improvement

UH has also incorporated another component of Sectra’s workflow orchestration suite, the technologist quality assurance tool (tech QA). “It is a great solution for providing feedback between staff. Within Sectra PACS, radiologists can directly send feedback to technologists’ supervisors if the quality of an exam is not good enough, or if images are missing,” comments Rosipko. She describes how the tech QA tool helps them keep track of errors on specific modalities, areas, or locations, to quickly find areas of improvement and if training is needed. “All feedback is handled by the supervisor of that group. The system prompts that a resolution is reported back to the radiologist on how the issue has been managed. This provides a closed feedback loop and has considerably improved learning,” she explains.

The benefits of workflow orchestration software

Learning more about their overall business and areas that need attention is the key benefit that UH has experienced from their use of the analytics dashboard and the tech QA tool. “Regarding the quality assurance workflow, the process we used previously was too cumbersome and now, the tech QA tool makes our feedback loop so much more efficient,” she says. They are currently evaluating the impact on the quality, but according to Rosipko, it has absolutely improved. “All in all, these tools have enabled us to much better understand our business. We have learned about radiologists’ reading patterns and exam distribution, and been able to begin to communicate back to staff where it is most needed,” she summarizes.

Another key benefit of the workflow orchestration tools has been the breaking down of silos between departments. This spans over multiple user groups and sites, including workflows that have previously been managed separately, providing a holistic overview for the health system.

More opportunities ahead

In the future, Rosipko is certain they will extend the use of the workflow orchestration solution to include automatic reallocation of exams. “This is the biggest opportunity I see for the moment, since reallocation of exams is a very time-consuming task. The use of automated workflow orchestration is most likely where we will see the greatest benefits of artificial intelligence in radiology in the short-term,” she says.

As previously mentioned, Rosipko’s team will also begin using the dashboard as an alarm if certain SLAs risk not being met, something that will guide the radiologists to select the exams with the highest priority.

Additionally, these tools will provide visibility to many others in the organization based on their role. “We must remember that these tools will bring about a culture change. We will continue to shift from Excel sheets and pivot tables to real-time analytics. Every step forward toward real-time monitoring provides significant benefits in terms of efficiency for the organization,” Rosipko concludes.