With so many options out there finding the right visitor management system for your hospice can be tough. That’s why we’ve put together this handy guide on the key criteria you should consider when looking for hospice visitor management solutions.
If you’re running a hospice, patient care is – of course – your number one priority, as well as the security of your patients, staff and the hospice itself. One great way to ensure your hospice is safe and secure – as well as free up time to spend with patients – is by automating your administration processes. A visitor management solution is a fantastic step on the road to automation, but finding the right system can be difficult. As such, we’ve created this guide to help you navigate your way through the hospice visitor management solutions on offer.
1. What features do you need?
Installing a visitor management system sends the message that your hospice takes safety and security seriously.
Have you decided you need a visitor management solution for your hospice but aren’t sure what features you need? We’ve compiled a list of the most vital features of a visitor check-in system you should look out for include:
- Staff, volunteer and (optional) visitor sign in
- Emergency evacuation lists
- Cloud data storage in compliance with GDPR
- A user-friendly interface
- Integration with existing access cards
- ID badge printing
- Support for multiple entrances/buildings
- Visitor pre-registration
If you’re looking for a visitor management solution that includes all of these features, VisiPoint could be the perfect solution for you. Get in touch to arrange a Free demonstration!
2. How should the system look?
It’s important that a visitor management system meets your needs not just in terms of features, but looks too. Visitor management solutions come in a number of different shapes and sizes and can be installed in the location that suits you best.
For example, you may need a discreet visitor management system that blends into its environment seamlessly. The perfect solution to this is a tablet-based system that can be mounted and seamlessly sunk into a wall. If your reception area is unmanned, a larger visitor management totem kiosk could be the perfect solution. Both types of can be connected to a camera, printer, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) reader, PC and printer.read more about that from Here
3. Would you like more time to care for patients?
In a hospice, you want to minimise administration time and costs so you can put as many resources as possible into patient care. Visitor management solutions facilitate this, providing a self-service sign-in solution that works in tandem with your reception in a much less labour-intensive way than your current system. No longer will you need to free-up a staff member to sit on the door or require visitors to ring a doorbell to summon a member of staff who must break-off what they are doing to answer it.
With a visitor management system, you can easily manage your visitors and track them whilst they are on your premises. It will significantly reduce staff time spent on reception duties, which, over the course of a year can add up substantially.
4. Do you want to save on resources?
One of your most precious resources as a hospice is your staff’s time, and a visitor management system can help make better use of it.
Do you still use a visitor book that often goes missing and that some people forget to sign, or fail to annotate with all their details, time of arrival and departure? Is a member of your team in charge of the book? Do they have to write out or print name badges and assemble them manually?
This staff member’s time could be better utilised elsewhere. Are you a manager who periodically must sit down with your visitor book and try and make sense of what it is telling you by struggling to create spreadsheets in Excel or some other software programme. Visitor management solutions make these types of activity redundant as they can produce any report you might need at the touch of a button.
In a busy hospice, the saving in paper alone by moving from a visitor book can be substantial enough to cover the cost of the system.
5. Do you want keep better track of your premises?
One of the best features of a visitor management system is the ability to keep track of everyone coming in and out of the premises. With visitors arriving at different points throughout the day as well as staff and volunteers working different shifts each week, it can be difficult to keep track of everything that goes on within your hospice. Hospices need to take particular care to ensure their patients are safe and secure, and having the ability to keep track of sign-in activity is a great way to improve patient safeguarding.
Real-time information on sign-in activity can easily be accessed through a cloud-based management dashboard, accessible on any tablet, laptop or smartphone. You can quickly and easily audit this information and spot patterns in visitors, staff and volunteers. This gives staff a greater feeling of control over the hospice and creates a safer environment for patients.
You can also control who has access to the premises. For example, you can provide staff and volunteers with ID cards allowing them to sign in using RFID. Different volunteers will work on different days and at different times. Do your paid staff know each of these volunteers? Can you be sure someone who you don’t want in the building has slipped through the net? A visitor management system will ensure only those people authorised to enter your premises are allowed in.
6. Are you looking to improve health and safety standards?
Ensuring staff and volunteers are aware of hospice health and safety requirements is incredibly important, so you need to pick a visitor management solution that lets you display this information front and centre.
When an employee logs in for the first time you will be told about the potential hazards in the workplace so you can protect your staff and comply with occupational safety regulations.
Need a visitor management system that covers all of this criteria and more? VisiPoint could be exactly what you’re looking for! We’re experts in the visitor management field, and we’d love to show you how VisiPoint could benefit your hospice. Get in touch today to arrange a free demonstration.