| Jewish Hospital Healthcare Services uses various DSS applications in the areas of productivity, cost accounting, case mix and nurse staff scheduling. The systems include modeling, forecasting, planning, communications, database management systems and graphics. Furthermore, all of the data are drawn from key clinical and financial systems so there is not inconsistency in the data used by different decision makers. This allows decision makers to consider problems and opportunities from more dimensions, with better support than ever before. For example, the DSS includes a "nursing acuity system" for classifying patients by the severity and nursing-needs associated with their illnesses. These calculations can be used by the nurse staffing scheduling system to estimate the demand for nurses on a daily basis. Not only does this system help nurse managers to plan schedules, the DSS helps them to evaluate heuristics they might employ in developing the schedule. For example, they can compare the estimated nurse staffing needs to the actual levels to determine if there are better ways of managing their staffs. In this era of managed care, such analyses help the hospitals use scarce resources more effectively. |
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