When the Covid pandemic struck, Provide Digital created and launched the Bed Bureau System over a single weekend.
The software provided the Essex NHS Trust with bed management online that allowed medical staff to quickly determine where beds were available in community hospitals as the pandemic escalated.
A web-based application, it tracked availability of beds on a public dashboard, keeping users updated with information about open beds and unavailable beds for seven days and even determining male and female ward space and categorising infections through a red, amber and green system.
The work here solved a huge administration problem, but more importantly, it saved lives.
While other hospitals around the country had Covid patients lining up in beds down corridors and were plagued with horrific images and stories splashed across the national press, Essex were able to efficiently manage the flow of patients and access resources they had previously had no comprehensive knowledge of.
After all, prior to Covid-19 all the health professionals didn’t really know about bed availability at community hospitals in the area because they simply didn’t need to. Overnight this became really important.
Our system allowed patients to call 999 and the call was then diverted to the Bed Bureau team who could look at bed availability and direct an ambulance accordingly.
The system is still in place today and used for other scenarios such as beds for stroke patients, ICU, maternity and virtual wards where people are monitored and treated from home.
