What is the Chineham Vaccination centre?
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, GPs in Basingstoke have mobilised and through strong collaboration, set up a COVID-19 Vaccination Centre. The centre based in the Hampshire Court Hotel has over 400 staff and volunteers working tirelessly to provide the safest environment for those attending. The centre had been tasked with administering over 100,000 vaccines in just 8 months. This is a goal they triumphantly hit in April. In March of 2021 the centre was also named one of the top five vaccination centres in the country, a true testament to the dedication of the staff and volunteers.
What challenges did they face?
The Covid-19 vaccines have specific storage requirements, needing to be kept in fridges at steady temperatures between 2 and 8 degrees celsius. If the temperature falls outside of these tolerances, the vaccines will spoil and are wasted. To maintain this the medical support team at the centre were required to manually check all the fridges, morning and evening, to ensure they were operating at the optimal temperature. At times when the centre was closed (6pm until 8am Monday to Friday and all weekend) the fridges and vaccines are left unattended.
The failure of a fridge can result in the loss of £10k worth of vaccines. In addition to the cold store maintenance, the centre was previously tied to a paper-based process which was subject to loss, damage and fraud. The clinical team felt that valuable time spent on this manual process, could be better spent on patient care.
How did Mindsett help?
We released time to care.
One of the key benefits of the cold chain monitoring technology provided by Mindsett is it allows the user to reallocate the time they would have spent manually checking the asset. In the case of a medical facility such as the vaccination centre this is of the utmost importance. If the medical staff and volunteers have their time released to focus it in other areas, like patient care.
We improved staff wellbeing and contributed to a better work/life balance.
When Mindsett introduced the remote cold chain monitoring to the vaccination centre there were certain changes noticed immediately. One of these changes was the reduction in stress amongst staff members, and a reported improvement in their work-life balance. This stems from removing the need to continuously monitor the refrigeration temperatures, and no staff member had the unfortunate task of coming in on the weekend.
We improved compliance.
Compliance is a significant area in any establishment, but it is held to a higher importance in a medical setting. The Mindsett cold chain monitoring system allows for automated reporting, meaning reports can be emailed direct to the CQC. This provides a real time audit trial, ensuring compliance across the centre.
We reduced wastage.
From the outset of the vaccine rollout in the UK, there were scathing reports in the media due to reports of vaccine wastage. Oftentimes this was due to appointment no-shows, but there were also instances of improper storage and refrigeration failure. The Mindsett solution offers real time alerts that notifies via a mobile application if there is a significant change in fridge temperature. This spike or drop could have been due to asset malfunction, human error, or incorrect settings. The app allows the staff member on duty to immediately rectify the issue. This removed the risk of loosing valuable vaccines.
We furthered the move to paperless reporting.
As the remote monitoring app provides real time reporting and notifications, it also allows for the storage of data related to the linked assets. As data is stored on the app and can be downloaded in a report format, it removes the need for paper based reporting. This means that the human error aspect of reporting is removed, along with the logistical issue of storing the paper reports.
We provided a unique product.
The Mindsett product is a wholly unique offering. We have found no other service providing the full range of software, hardware, user interface and data in one seamless package.
“The peace of mind that this simple but effective, technology brings to play cannot be underestimated.”- Dr.Tim Cooper, Practice Partner and Clinical Doctor.
If you would like to explore how you could incorporate IoT technology into your organisation, contact us at info@mindsett.co.uk.
Check out some of our blog posts to learn more about IoT technologies, and how it can further your organisations net zero journey, and release your workers time to serve here.
