Project helps municipalities and hospitals to a better collaboration on optimizing supervision and benefiting from technology

When a patient pathway crosses regions and municipalities, it is crucial to involve all partners in the planning – preferably also an external advisor who can see the big picture. These are the experiences from South Jutland, where the Learning and Research House, Hospital Sønderjylland has established a strong technology collaboration with the four surrounding municipalities.

The collaboration aims to investigate the inspections that go across the hospital and municipality by, among other things, optimizing workflows and exploiting the technological opportunities that exist. Ultimately, the hope is that the collaboration between the hospital and the municipalities will create increased security for citizens and employees.

Need for better dialogue about technologies

The project participants chose to take their starting point in the existing ‘Get Home Safely’ programme, which today works in collaboration between Hospital Sønderjylland and the municipalities of Aabenraa, Haderslev, Sønderborg and Tønder. In collaboration with the Danish Technological Institute and two private companies, the project has developed a new digital technology-driven concept for ‘Get Home Safely’.

– It has been important for us to create a better dialogue about technologies between municipalities and hospitals. Therefore, we have chosen a specific project to collaborate on, where it has been crucial that all the relevant municipalities have been involved from the start. And it has been valuable to have a knowledge institution that could see our work from a different perspective and has experience of how we can use technology in the different phases, says Lone Boysen Lauritzen, learning and project consultant, Hospital Sønderjylland.

The project ‘Monitoring citizens and patients in their own homes’ is supported by the Danish Agency for Higher Education and Science.

See other projects supported by the Danish Agency for Higher Education and Science here

Collaboration between the hospital and four municipalities

The project points to the vision of the Danish Health Reform 2024 that a strong digital and data-supported healthcare system is crucial for the transformation of the healthcare system and will, among other things, contribute to supporting more people being treated in their own homes.

The aim of the project was to develop new forms of technological collaboration using a generic and digitally supported course, which was to be tested against the already ongoing project for discharge of patients with hip fractures in collaboration between Hospital Sønderjylland and the four municipalities in Southern Jutland.

The project was based on elderly people with walking difficulties as a target group. When this group is discharged from the orthopaedic surgery department at Hospital Sønderjylland, they are dependent on home care and mobilization in their own home. That is why they are part of the cross-sectoral offer ‘Get Home Safely’.

From September 2023 to June 2024, 256 citizens were discharged for the ‘Get Home Safely’ offer in the four municipalities. Today, the offer consists of 18 physical visits by different professional groups in the citizen’s home. The process is therefore resource-intensive both for municipalities and for citizens.

Great potential in the use of technology

There is a huge potential for using technology to meet some of the political requirements for prevention, treatment and early detection in the municipalities and citizens’ homes, says Martin Grønbæk Jensen, Business Manager, Innovation and Digital Transformation at the Danish Technological Institute.

– In the project, we took advantage of the fact that ‘Get Home Safely’ was already scheduled. Therefore, we were able to work together to identify some points for data collection, where a physical visit could be replaced or supported by technology and thereby optimize the knowledge collected. In several phases, data was based on the citizen’s subjective statements, and here we have tried to create a model that also includes factual data, such as measuring the citizen’s vital parameters, explains Martin Grønbæk Jensen.

Companies ready to provide monitoring and communication

Two private companies, Ward24/7 and Teton.ai, provided sparring on the technological possibilities to streamline the repatriation concept. The companies provide monitoring and communication technologies that can support the new concept.

The companies’ solutions can, among other things, measure activity, sleep patterns, toilet visits, intake of food and drink and vital values. This helps to relieve the citizens, so that they do not have to remember the scope of their chores, which may seem unmanageable for an elderly citizen who lives alone and has just been discharged from the hospital.

The business case in the project shows an offer that is less costly because the citizen does not have to be visited by as many staff in their home. This means that there is potential to free up healthcare professionals for other purposes and tasks in home care. In addition, the understanding of the citizen’s physical condition has been optimized in several areas with real-time health data from monitoring technologies, according to the project’s report.

Increased collaboration is an added benefit

Another benefit of the project is that Hospital Sønderjylland and the four municipalities have strengthened their collaboration on technology and data exchange, says Lone Boysen Lauritzen.
In continuation of the project, a cross-sectoral welfare and health technology network has been established in South Jutland with the Learning and Research House, and Hospital Sønderjylland, as coordinators.

– It has been a very rewarding process, where we have gained insight into the work of the subject matter experts across the sectors. The project is highly relevant, and we are now on our way to taking the first innovative steps towards the requirements of the new health reform, where we will be forced into new relationships and structures across hospitals and municipalities, says Lone Boysen Lauritzen.

The hope is now that the municipalities will stick to it and test the new concept for repatriation. Each municipality has the opportunity to initiate trial actions and will be able to use the network to share their experiences.

The Danish Life Science Cluster is co-financed by the Danish Board of Business Development and the European Regional Development Fund.