The Benefits Of A Healthcare-Specific IT Help Desk

This case study highlights how Continuum Health Partners and Oakwood Healthcare, Inc. were able to improve patient and clinician support and satisfaction with the help of an outsourced IT help desk.

The CareTech Solutions' Service Desk Maturity Model is a way to gauge where a healthcare organization is in terms of providing IT help desk support for its end users.

Developed to mirror the HIMSS Analytics EMR Adoption Model, the Service Desk Maturity Model, beginning with Stage 0 (a lack of dedicated support) through Stage 6 (fully structured Service Desk focusing on root cause analysis, cause elimination, service metrics, remote support tools, customer surveys, communication management and more), defines the different levels of IT support hospitals will require as they become more electronic.

In February 2011, the Service Desk Maturity Model was featured in the HIMSS11 track session, "The Healthcare-Specific Help Desk" with Oakwood Healthcare Inc. and Continuum Health Partners sharing their respective journeys to elevate their health systems' IT help desks in preparation for the unique needs of clinical end users as more care-giving technologies came online.

Continuum Health Partners
In 2008 Continuum Health Partners' (CHP) help desk was at a Stage 2. It had some functions in place, but lacked the tools and processes needed to effectively and consistently respond to the increasing number of healthcare-specific end-user queries. The missing elements were:

• Agents trained in healthcare
• Clinical and technical knowledge base
• Network performance monitoring tools
• Remote control tools

In order to quickly integrate these elements into CHP's IT support organization, CHP chose to partner with CareTech Solutions. Within the first three months, CHP cited a noticeable improvement in end-user support, and after one year, end-user satisfaction increased dramatically. Noted performance improvements were:

• Employees reached help desk analysts significantly faster.
• Employee abandonment rate dropped dramatically.
• Employees spent less time with help desk analysts.
• Employee issues were resolved on the first call.

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