The Enroute platform streamlines the process of transporting patients from one place to another within the hospital in the least amount of time.

At the 1,041-bed Tampa General Hospital the complex task of managing its operational flow, including the processes of admitting, moving and discharging patients, has been made more efficient through the use of Enroute, an AI platform. The new system is a marked improvement over the earlier, manual process where a dispatcher scheduled all of the runs throughout the hospital. (Yahoo Finance)

If the patient needed to be transported from their hospital room to surgery, the dispatcher assigned the transporter via a message alert on a hospital-issued secure device. However, Tampa General Hospital collaborated with Enroute, an American company, to combine its hospitalization data with AI for real time visibility and optimization of transporter resources.

“With Enroute, we can see the transporters’ availability, location, and if they have a wheelchair or stretcher with them in real time,” said Donna Tope, senior director of support services at the academic medical center. “The system can then automatically assign the closest transporter with the right equipment to transport that patient. It’s critical to our world-class care that the patient transport department be as efficient as possible in moving patients to the services they need to recover.”

The AI system communicates through a dedicated Tampa General device to issue instructions via a secure electronic medical record. Enroute’s SaaS-based software can perform multiple assignments at the same time and help team members move patients as efficiently as possible. Already, some Tampa General departments have achieved patient transportation times decrease as much as 35% on average when compared to the previous two months.

The payoffs from the Enroute AI platform include increased bed utilization, reduced waiting time, avoidance of conflict when scheduling patient trips, and the minimization of the number of patient trips through co-ordination of multiple trips.

The collaboration with Enroute was made possible via TGH Innoventures, the hospital’s innovation center and venture capital fund, which aims to promote innovation at Tampa General Hospital by partnering with and investing in early-stage startups.

“As part of the program, Enroute worked closely with our transport and innovation teams to refine the AI platform’s design to elevate the transport process, while maintaining standards of excellence in patient care,” said Rachel Feinman, vice president of innovation at Tampa General and managing director of TGH Innoventures.

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