Bangkok Hospital Streamlines Patient Flow with AI
Bangkok Hospital, one of Thailand’s largest private healthcare providers, has moved away from the paper-based, manual process of registering and managing patient flows at its head office.
AI technologies from its partner, local startup Agnos Health, now form the basis of its patient registration and management systems.
HOW IT WORKS
As part of the improved patient flow system, the tertiary hospital has implemented self-service kiosks that run on multiple AIs and integrate different registration steps.
It features AI facial recognition to identify and confirm patient identities; an AI symptom checker that first screens a patient’s history to refer them to an appropriate department or clinic; and robotic process automation for automatic insurance verification. The system can also obtain a patient’s identity electronic consent for the collection of personal data and the issuance of e-visit slips to track service status.
Meanwhile, the Bangkok hospital’s Health Design Center (HDC) control department has also switched from manual distribution of patient queues to a digital system.
Nurses can now monitor and manage patient queues, with the status communicated to patients via mobile channels and the ward’s TV screen. The system has an AI that tracks service status and rearranges rooms to reduce foot traffic in certain areas.
HDC can now send electronic forms for patients to fill out even before they go to the hospital. An AI will assess these for health risks and then recommend appropriate control packages.
The department’s AI co-pilot processes patients’ checklists, wait times, appointments and clinical priorities to recommend an optimal examination sequence.
WHY IT MATTERS
Since expanding the registration system with AI, Bangkok Hospital saw a reduction in front-end and back-end procedures, including recording patients’ medical history. Waiting times were also reduced, as registration steps were reduced by 45% compared to the previous system.
The hospital claims The queues for patients in the control department are now also evenly distributed. The HDC manages between 200 and 300 patients daily, each with different check-ups, procedures and time. With AI, staff spend less time educating patients on their wait times and next steps, and answering frequently repeated questions. Wait times have been halved compared to the previous manual system.
THE BIGGER TREND
Private hospital operators in Thailand have been increasingly investing in and implementing data and digital technologies in recent years as part of their digital transformation initiatives.
Srisawan HospitalA private tertiary hospital in Nakhon Sawan, a city north of Bangkok, recently enlisted the help of GE HealthCare and InterSystems to digitize asset and staff resource management and install an integrated HIS at its Bangkok branch.
To prove its maturity in using EMR technology, Princ Hospital Suvarnabhumi, part of the privately owned Principle Healthcare Group, underwent the assessment for Phase 7 of the HIMSS Model for the implementation of electronic medical recordsIt is currently the only hospital in Thailand to have achieved this highest validation, which it received earlier this year.