The Challenge

St. Joseph Hospital and Children’s Hospital of Orange County each needed an automated solution to deliver patient care services with greater efficiency, increased speed and with high reliability within their individual facilities. They each needed a system that could safely deliver laboratory specimens, blood products, medications, medical records and other items essential to patient care units within the growing medical complex.

In addition, the two independently operated hospitals needed a system that could be easily expandable to link the essential services shared between the two facilities. The distance between the hospitals made manual transport inefficient compared to automated transport methods.   

The Solution

When CHOC opened its main facility in late 1991 it began a new era for the hospital, which included a state-of-the-art pneumatic tube system from Swisslog TransLogic. The tube system delivers critical materials faster and more efficiently than was possible through manual labor.

Originally, the system served nursing stations, Inpatient and Outpatient Pharmacy, Orthopedic Center and Central Supplies. But, the real benefit of the tube system came in 1996 when St. Joseph Hospital installed a six-inch CTS-30 pneumatic tube system from Swisslog TransLogic and linked it to CHOC. The systems are connected through a tunnel underneath a street between the two hospitals. With compatible systems, the two hospitals fully benefit from the mutual services agreement they share.

Through this agreement, St. Joseph provides CHOC with laboratory, radiology, surgery, occupational and physical therapy services. Although both hospitals are administered and operated independently, the tube system now enables an effective sharing of services between buildings. “Our emergency room is located at St. Joseph’s,” said John Torres, CHOC facilities engineer. “That’s where our pneumatic tube system comes into play. Our nursing stations are drawing samples that are sent by tube to St. Joseph’s laboratory for processing. We want to speed up the process so we can get the patient processed through the system.”

The tube system links CHOC with St. Joseph’s main laboratory, blood bank and operating room. Because of the distance separating the two facilities, the tube system, which transports carriers at a speed of 25 feet per second, provides prompt, efficient delivery of patient-care items.

The Blood Bank
The St. Joseph Blood Bank and Donor Center uses the tube system extensively to transport blood products to areas where they are needed throughout the two hospitals. First, the tube system is used to send blood products from the donor for compatibility testing. This step relieves the manual transport required of the phlebotomy staff. Second, once testing is complete, the Blood Bank sends the product through the tube system to the nursing stations or surgery units, which could be hundreds of feet away.

“Instead of having someone transport the blood or having a nurse come pick it up, we’re able to use the TransLogic system which saves time for many people,” says Alan Magray, Supervisor of the Blood Bank and Donor Center at St. Joseph.

He says that distance between the Blood Bank and CHOC is significant enough that the tube system makes a major difference in enhancing patient care and prompt delivery of blood where needed. Using a system like this requires excellent reliability. “It (the system) almost never goes down. We’re more efficient in terms of transporting blood products,” he adds. “We particularly like TransLogic because of its computerized capabilities, such as tracking carriers through the system.”

Laboratory and Pharmacy
The main laboratory at St. Joseph serves the entire hospital, as well as CHOC. The tube system is used extensively to send specimens into a laboratory processing area where they are sorted and prepared for testing. An average day may include over 200 transactions.

The major benefit of the tube system to the laboratory has been its ability to provide timely processing and testing of specimens 24-hours a day. Instead of waiting for couriers to arrive with a batch for testing or even during busy times when there might have been a back up in the past, the tube system helps regulate the workflow and provide timely results. The ultimate winner is the patient, who receives faster, more responsive care.

St. Joseph’s Pharmacy has also been a major beneficiary of the TransLogic system. “When I first came here we had messengers because we did not have a tube system at all,” recalls Gary Ostrowski, assistant director of pharmacy services. “From a basic monetary level it is a reliable, dependable way to receive medication orders and to send medications. One benefit of the TransLogic system is that it is flexible; you can send a carrier to any number of destinations in the hospital.”

The Pharmacy receives a computer printout with orders from nursing stations. Then labels are printed out to indicate if the entry is oral or unit dose, and then a pharmacist will fill and return the order through the tube system to the nursing station or other designation where needed. “Without the tube system, we would need messengers working around the clock,” he added.

The pharmacy at CHOC is equally reliant upon the TransLogic system for increased efficiency of their operation. The tube system links the CHOC pharmacy with the other floors in the hospital, as well as the shared services with St. Joseph’s. Almost every order sent to the Pharmacy is filled and distributed through the tube system. In fact, CHOC is regularly sending chemo drugs through their tube system under very strict guidelines.

The Results

During its first 10 years in operation, CHOC has recorded over 1 million tube system transactions, an average of 2,600 a day through both hospitals. St. Joseph contracted Swisslog TransLogic in 2000 to dramatically expand its tube system to its Pavilion Outpatient Building across the street, to replace sections of an outdated tube system, and to install new stations in areas where the hospital is streamlining its operations by consolidating and centralizing various departments.

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