On the other side of the negotiating table with the hospital (in addition to lawyers), is Ross High School senior and Butler Tech student Austin Klei.
Klei is the 17-year-old founder and chief executive officer of Glance Software LLC, a tenant of business incubator The Hamilton Mill. He and his classmates developed the program to improve the rounding process of top hospital leadership and are about to close their first of likely many business deals to come.
“They give us the foot in the door for expanding to other hospitals,” said Klei, who added he wants to take the product to market and lead the industry for patient experience technology. “What we want to do is build the business where any hospital can use the software.”
The hospital needed a program to track rounding by administrators, nursing executives and compliance staff, but it found existing software to be too pricey and not very adaptable, said Tom Daskalakis, site administrator for West Chester Hospital, which is part of the UC Health hospital network affiliated with University of Cincinnati. So, the hospital turned to Butler Technology and Career Development Schools to see if its students could make something better, Daskalakis said.
“Not only was it customizable… (the students) don’t know the word no. We’d always say ‘is this possible?’ Their response would be yes,” Daskalakis said. “Not only did they figure out a way, it was done very quickly.”
The cloud application, which can be accessed on tablets, mobile phones and desktop computers, is used when hospital leaders visit patients and ask them about their stay; to survey the building for any facility problems such as holes in the wall or trash bins that need emptied; and for safety purposes to ask employees if they have the tools they need to do their jobs. The system replaces paper files.
Patient experience is one of the measures used by the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to measure hospital quality and to determine reimbursement rates for services, according to Butler Tech and the hospital.
“We’re making sure that people understand their plan of care, that their quality and safety is being met,” said Chief Nursing Officer Patrick Baker.
Features of the program, called RoundSpark, allow users to take dictation, to send pictures and emails, and to make other notes while they’re on the go and before they return to their desk.
One of the biggest benefits is being able to track the progress to see if an issue that was raised was resolved, hospital officials said.
“We identify are there emerging trends that are developed, has something that was identified the last time been addressed yet?” Baker said. “With good data, it allows you to make better decisions and ask better questions.”
The local hospital tested the program for about two months before entering negotiations on an agreement to buy it. There’s not enough data yet to say if the program moved the needle on patient satisfaction scores, but Daskalakis expects to see results show up as the program continues to be tweaked.
Based on the success to date, sister hospital University of Cincinnati Medical Center is expected to also start using RoundSpark, Daskalakis said.
“It’s still too early to measure that, but what we’re seeing at least from the administrative front that our loop closures are much more efficient and issues are addressed quicker so we know that will have a positive impact on satisfaction,” he said.
Glance Software joined The Hamilton Mill in 2015 and specializes in creative software solutions for various industries, according to Klei. It began as a student company that participated in the organization Students for the Advancement of Global Entrepreneurship, which was part of Butler Tech’s information technology curriculum offered at Ross High School.
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