Sopra Steria, Sunnaas Hospital, and the start-up Nordic Analysis have developed a complete solution together that they couldn't have found without cooperating.
Risk and vulnerability assessment of medical technical equipment in Health Norway costs a lot and takes a long time. It goes beyond resource allocation, efficiency and experience for patients, especially during the corona crisis. At Sunnaas hospital they have solved the challenges with the solution ROSa - an automated risk and vulnerability assessment.
"We have created a solution for the future," says CEO of the start-up company Nordic Analysis, Volker Seyffert, who together with Sopra Steria and Sunnaas hospital have developed the solution.
In the Norwegian health system, it takes a long time to adopt new technology or new medical equipment, because it requires a comprehensive risk and vulnerability assessment to be in line with legislation related to privacy, Norwegian health standards
and pre-existing systems. Innovation Manager at Sunnaas Hospital Sveinung Tornås, believes this is especially a problem in the corona crisis.
- With today's situation with covid-19, we are in the midst of challenges that hospitals have never experienced before, with limited access to resources. There is a great need to find new equipment and technology that can make the Norwegian health system able to handle
the situation even better, says Tornås, and further states that automated risk and vulnerability assessments can make a positive contribution to the situation:
- Today, it takes about 100 hours to perform a non-complex risk and vulnerability assessment. When the
hospitals do not have the capacity to carry out the assessments themselves, they can order external expertise, but then the waiting time is up to 6 months to complete and approve it for use in the hospitals, says Tornås.
This is no longer the case at Sunnaas Hospital after using the ROSa solution, which automates risk and vulnerability assessments. Sunnaas hospital can now conduct more assessments locally at the hospital, in less time.
Tornås himself first came up with the idea of automating the time-consuming process of these absolutely necessary assessments, and he asked Sopra Steria in collaboration with Nordic Analysis, to look at opportunities. Tornås is
very pleased with the result:
- Today's way of conducting risk and vulnerability assessments is manual, non-scalable and largely dependent on the person conducting the assessment having previously assessed similar equipment. ROSa is an easy-to-use digital tool where input is stored
as data and helps to standardize the existing process.
Proactive risk management
CEO of Nordic Analysis, Volker Seyffert, further explains that the new solution provides better overview and great value for the hospital:
- The hospital gets a much better overview of all the analyzes that are completed, which means that they can work with proactive risk management. Through this project we create great value, because the quality of risk and vulnerability assessments
increases and the process is streamlined. This is important as the need for good risk and vulnerability assessments has increased dramatically, and today applies to virtually all industries, says Tornås.
Tornås further believes that cooperation has been important for its success: - It's amazing to see how a large company like Sopra Steria, together with Sunnaas Hospital, and a start-up company like Nordic Analysis, have jointly developed a complete solution that they couldn't have found without cooperating.
Project manager Andreas Birkeland from Sopra Steria agrees, adding: - We have a good working relationship with clearly defined roles. I think that's the key to success. In the project group, it means less which company you come from, because we are all equally motivated to create value for Health Norway, says Birkeland.
Birkeland thinks it is particularly rewarding to contribute to a better health system: - It is very valuable to participate in projects that have the potential to give a real benefit, and thereby a better health system for all of us. I can see how this motivates everyone in the project.
Scalable platform
CEO of Nordic Analysis, Volker Seyffert, looks forward to continuing: - We have developed a platform that can be reused and scaled to streamline many different types of risk analysis. I look forward to continuing phase two of the project, and also manufacturing the solution in many different health enterprises in the future.
Birkeland agrees:
- Initially, we establish this for Sunnaas hospital, but there are a lot of other hospitals that are performing the same analyzes today. Each hospital is responsible for conducting its own risk and vulnerability assessments and approving the equipment they wish to use.
Birkeland concludes by emphasizing the importance of effective risk and vulnerability assessments, in crises such as the corona crisis.
- In this covid-19 situation, we risk conducting risk and vulnerability assessments in parallel on the same equipment at different hospitals, which is a huge waste of time and resources. Rather, the focus should be on getting the best equipment as quickly as possible. This solution can be quickly established, increase efficiency and shorten the way that the Norwegian health system can use the best of new equipment and technology to save lives faster, concludes Birkeland.