Hoana Medical Expands Partnership With The Queen's Medical Center to Improve Patient...

Hoana Medical Expands Partnership With The Queen's Medical Center to Improve
Patient Safety
Visionary Hawai'i Hospital Expands Cutting-Edge Patient Safety Technology

HONOLULU, Aug. 5 /PRNewswire/ -- Hoana Medical, Inc. announced today that
The Queen's Medical Center will equip 100 additional medical-surgical floor
hospital beds with Hoana's LifeBed(TM) Patient Vigilance Systems (LifeBed),
bringing the total number LifeBed's available at Queen's to about 150.
Hoana's technology transforms any bed into a LifeBed, which invisibly tracks a
patient's basic vital signs without any connection to the patient whatsoever.
However, if the patient is in trouble, the LifeBed alerts the nurse --
essentially providing "another set of eyes" to look after the patient.
"We are excited about the LifeBed because it has improved our quality of
care. Typically medical-surgical nurses care for four to five patients. The
LifeBed operates like a surveillance system that provides another set of
'eyes' that monitor the patient's condition," said Cindy Kamikawa, chief
nursing officer at Queen's. "Changes in a patient's condition from due to
medications, changes in physiologic conditions, or other treatments are
identified early by the LifeBed, which results in early interventions and
positively impacts patient outcome."
"Queen's is an excellent partner. It's great to work with visionary
leadership at the national forefront in patient quality and safety," said Dr.
Patrick Sullivan, CEO of Hoana Medical.
"Research has shown that rapid response teams (RRT) are not effective if
the patient is found too late -- many times patients are found in critical
condition, or even deceased, also referred to as a 'dead in bed,'" said Dr.
Larry Burgess, vice president of medical affairs for Hoana Medical and a
practicing ENT surgeon and Professor at the University of Hawai'i John Burns
School of Medicine. "The Joint Commission's (hospital accreditation authority)
newly released patient safety goals for 2009 highlight the fact that merely
responding to a patient in need is not enough -- early recognition of these
patients in distress is the key to saving lives and Queen's has always been a
leader in this area."
Hoana's LifeBed(TM) Patient Vigilance System identifies patients as they
begin to deteriorate and immediately notifies the hospital nursing staff --
all invisible to the patient since there is no physical connection to the
patient whatsoever. The LifeBed has experience on more than 15,000 acute-care
medical-surgical patients around the country, or more than 1.5 million patient
hours, and has shown that errors and accidents don't discriminate between
social or economic classes; it can happen to anybody, anywhere.
"Our experience shows that something as simple as finding patients in
trouble early makes an enormous difference in their outcome. Using something
as simple as the LifeBed to find patients in trouble on the general ward is
clearly enhancing the effectiveness of rapid response teams nationwide -- it's
the missing link to solving an enormous problem that touches one-in-four
Americans each year," said Dr. Sullivan.
Recent studies show respiratory function is the leading indicator of
pending patient distress. The Joint Commission wrote that 4 to 17 percent of
inpatient admissions have critical events such as cardiopulmonary and
respiratory arrests and vital sign changes, with warning signs preceding
events by an average of 6 to 8 hours (Joint Commission, 2007).
With nearly 40 percent of all unexpected hospital deaths occurring on the
medical-surgical floor, continuous patient vigilance is a rapidly growing
trend. Hospitals across the country are working to implement solutions that
meet the Joint Commission's patient safety goals for 2009, while enhancing
nurse and patient satisfaction. With most medical facilities around the
country looking for ways to improve patient safety and satisfaction, the
LifeBed represents new technology that will enhance the standard of care on
the general care floor.
About The Queen's Medical Center
The Queen's Medical Center, located in downtown Honolulu, Hawai'i, is a
private, non-profit, acute medical care facility. The medical center has more
than 3,000 employees and over 1,200 physicians on staff. As the leading
medical referral center in the Pacific Basin, Queen's offers a comprehensive
range of primary and specialized care services. Queen's is accredited by the
Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) and
affiliated with the Voluntary Hospitals of America (VHA). Queen's Medical
center is a 505 bed tertiary medical center. The Mission of the medical center
is to fulfill the intent of Queen Emma and King Kamehameha IV to provide in
perpetuity quality health care services to improve the well being of Native
Hawaiians and all the people of Hawaii.
About Hoana Medical, Inc.
Launched in 2002, Hoana Medical, Inc. is the world's leading healthcare
company focused on "Intelligent Medical Vigilance" in acute care hospitals
where approximately 200,000 people die from errors and mistakes. Its first
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-cleared offering, the LifeBed(TM)
Patient Vigilance System ("LifeBed"), transforms any hospital bed into a
LifeBed(TM) System by tracking a patient's vital signs without any wires or
connections to the patient. At the intersection between information
technology and medical devices, the LifeBed(TM) System acts like another set
of eyes for the nurse and alerts if a patient is in trouble. It delivers
"vigilance" in an un-tethered and invisible manner, however, if the patient is
in trouble, the LifeBed(TM) System calls for help. Experience on more than
15,000 individual hospital patients around the U.S. has yielded dramatic
stories of nurses intervening to save a patient's life. Hoana is
headquartered in Honolulu, Hawai'i. For more information, please visit
http://www.hoana.com
SOURCE Hoana Medical, Inc.

Sonja Brown of Hoana Medical, Inc., +1-916-396-6533, +1-808-523-5410