Low-cost digitalisation opportunities in healthcare: a histopathology department case study
Published in Low-Cost Digital Solutions for Industrial Automation (LoDiSA 2023), 2023-09-25
Proposes a set of methods to identify digital technology opportunities and prioritise their adoption in an histopathology department, using one in an East of England regional hospital as a case study.
Abstract: Healthcare facilities are critical social infrastructures that need timely intervention and careful management for seamless operations. Digital technologies offer significant advantages to healthcare infrastructures, especially in the post-COVID era. They improve access to care, facilitate communication and collaboration among healthcare professionals, and enable data-driven decision-making, ultimately leading to more efficient and effective healthcare delivery. This paper identifies the different aspects that can be digitalised in a hospital department, focusing on clinical laboratory settings. This work aims at defining the operational criticality of each stage of the process to support the evaluation of the their digitalisation opportunities. This enables the possibility of re-using low-cost, off-the-shelf technologies for industrial digitalisation, thus bridging the gap between industry and hospitals. We propose a set of methods to identify the digital technologies opportunities and prioritise their adoption in an histopathology department. The main variables controlling each space/function of the laboratory are modelled, the process phases are prioritised, and a set of existing and potential new digital technologies are identified within each chosen histopathology process phase. The benefits to deploying and adopting these digital technologies are identified, while adopting a low-cost digitalisation approach. The results of a pilot case, involving the Operations Managers of the Histopathology department in a regional hospital in the UK, show two main benefits that can be achieved; namely increasing the laboratory efficiency, in terms of throughput and turnaround Time (TAT), and increasing the granularity of information gathering.
Recommended citation:
N. Moretti, A. Mukherjee, Y.-C. Chan, G. Yilmaz, J. Merino, M. Sasidharan, Z. Rosun, C. Carr, D. McFarlane, and A. K. Parlikad, “Low-cost digitalisation opportunities in healthcare: a histopathology department case study,” in Low-Cost Digital Solutions for Industrial Automation (LoDiSA 2023), (Cambridge, UK), pp. 62–68, Sept. 2023.