Do you have questions about the Clinical & Systems Transformation (CST) project? Here are answers to a few of the commonly asked questions and there’s plenty more on the CST website . We’d love to know what else you want to hear about, so please send your questions to info@CSTproject.ca.

Have the right people been involved in design?

The team members and subject matter expert recruited to the CST design teams were chosen using multiple criteria including, but not limited to:

• current area of work;
• skill set excellence;
• leadership potential;
• inter-organizational awareness, and;
• willingness to be involved in the CST project.

Deliberate care was also taken to ensure appropriate representation across all three Health Organizations (including facilities, sites, specialties and relationships). Team members and subject matter experts are listed on the CST project website under ‘Our Work.’

When will I know what impact this will have on me?

Our new clinical information system is still under development. We will know more about the specific changes that will have an impact once system design has been approved, the clinical workflows design is complete and we’ve had time to look at the big picture. In the meantime, we are working to understand and compile the changes. We expect to have more detailed information about the main changes this fall and winter.

What training materials and resources will be available for staff?

Over 42,000 staff, providers, students and non-employees will be impacted by CST and will require education and practice on the new clinical information system.

A variety of learning approaches will be provided to support multiple audiences with different learning needs in preparation for go-live and beyond. End-users of the systems and those impacted by workflow changes will attend a combination of self-paced online learning sessions and specialized classroom courses. This training will be complemented by hands-on practice with the new clinical information system, both in and out of the classroom.

How will staff be supported in the lead up to implementation?

Preparing staff for the new clinical practices and technology is a significant undertaking. To help achieve our goal, organizational readiness teams have been established with representatives from Change Management, Transformational Learning, Communications and Benefits Evaluation teams to work with and support local teams in the implementation. These teams have developed strategies that include a range of activities to support leaders and their staff through this large-scale transformation project.

An Integrated Site Plan will be tailored for each site and will cover the actions required to be taken before a site goes-live with a new clinical information system.

Will we have access to the technical and medical devices we need?

We understand it is imperative our health professionals have the right devices in place to support their work.

A Clinical Device Task Force, made up of multi-disciplinary professionals from across VCH, PHSA and PHC is currently working to determine the devices needed to support clinical practices. This includes equipment such as barcode scanners, medication carts and label printers.

The Clinical Device Task Force will produce a shortlist of devices that will meet the needs of clinical users, known as the device playbook. Once the playbook is defined, CST will engage site coordinators to conduct a device assessment. Site coordinators will be able to choose devices that meet the needs of their site from the device playbook.

Background information

• CST is a joint initiative of VCH, PHSA and PHC, and one of the largest and most complex healthcare projects in Canada. It spans across several areas of the continuum of care, including: acute care inpatient and outpatient units and ambulatory care. As well as creating consistent, leading practices, and a shared clinical information system, CST will deliver HIMSS Level 5 functionality.

• Clinical design teams, made up of hundreds of highly-skilled, multi-disciplinary professionals from across the three Health Organizations and Team IBM (experts from IBM Technical Services, Deloitte, Leidos Solution Builders, and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre), started work on April 7, 2014. These teams are tasked with designing our future workflows, based on leading practices. In doing so, they are defining the requirements for our new clinical information system.

For more information, please contact:
Dr. Kellé Payne, CST Executive Director/Transformation Lead, VCH (Joint) – kelle.payne@vch.ca
Donna Stanton, CST Executive Director/Transformation Lead, VCH (Joint) – donna.stanton@vch.ca