A lot of people talk about what they want to do or who they want to be. Companies do it too. They talk about their vision or their purpose, but what does it all really mean? To believe in what you are doing, is that vision? What is the purpose of the work I am doing?

These were the types of questions I asked myself when I was sitting in a chair at Sarasota Memorial Hospital. My wife was recovering from complications with her Diabetes, so I had a lot of time to sit, stare blankly at my laptop screen, and ponder the impact our solution has on healthcare and even further, on my life directly, in this moment. I had the same reoccurring thoughts, as I watched nurses come in every thirty to sixty minutes to test her blood sugar levels. This isn’t just marketing; they are really using the product to help my wife recover. This is real.

I did not understand the true importance of the Voalte solution until I saw it in action. I watched as someone triple checked the basal rate of insulin my wife received every hour. The nurse used the product we sold, making sure not to double up on the dosage. It really hit home at that moment, how lucky we were to be in one of the best hospitals in the world, a hospital, which is running Voalte.

You hear sales pitch after sales pitch, involving the vision or purpose of a company, but you don't really understand the reality until you experience it first hand. I understand, now more then ever, what it means to have purpose in my work. It’s not about hitting a sales goal. It's about building something that is capable of impacting the quality of care your child, parent, or spouse receives. I love being a part of something like that... I was sitting in the hospital room while my wife recovered when purpose slapped me in the face.

As a Voalté project manager, I’m able to see and experience quite a bit when going through hospital installations and upgrades. Funny part is that no matter how many times I go through either, the experiences vary every time.

We commonly joke by saying, “Once you’ve seen one hospital install, you’ve seen one hospital install”. Truth is - no hospital is the same and therefore we shouldn’t expect units to be the same either.

An ER at Sarasota Memorial Hospital operates much differently from either a step-down unit in the same hospital or the ER at Heartland Health in St. Joseph, Missouri. That’s where the communication component plays such a critical role. From my experience, building in communication with leaders of each unit can go a long way in making sure a roll-out goes as smoothly as possible.

Getting clinicians involved from the start of the project helps build user acceptance and guarantee project success. Not only does the clinical team act as cheerleaders for the project - aiding buy-in from users that are less apt to accept change or may be technophobic - they also add valuable insight on how to shape the solution to the needs of the hospital and clinicians.

The concept is quite simple. Why buy tools for others to use without their involvement? It’s like having someone else buy you shoes without asking you what size you wear and how you plan to use them - to walk or to run. 

How is your hospital bridging the healthcare communication gap?