BEAM has been implemented in several 24-hour operations at Mount Alvernia Hospital.

Y3 Technologies, a Singapore-based software development company, has partnered open source solutions provider Red Hat to develop Asia’s first open source hospital bed management system.

The Bed Efficiency, Administration and Management (BEAM) system, which has been deployed in Mount Alvernia Hospital, is the result of a collaborative initiative for open source software development initiated by Red Hat under the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore’s (IDA’s) Infocomm Local Industry Upgrading Programme (iLIUP).

The BEAM system uses wireless and mobile technologies to track patient admissions and bed occupancy status. The system provides real-time information on patient admissions, housekeeping status and bed allocations for the front office, admissions department and nursing wards. The system also proactively notifies the housekeeping department of patients who will be discharged throughout the day. With the BEAM system, Mount Alvernia Hospital has cut bed turnaround time to less than 30 minutes, and increased the efficiency of this critical function by 30 per cent.

Bed capacity, bed demand forecasting and resource planning information is made available via an easy-to-use dashboard. From the dashboard, Mount Alvernia's management team can monitor key performance indicators, such as hospital bed occupancy rates, average length of hospital stay, bed demand projections, and time spent on housekeeping duties.

BEAM has been implemented in several 24-hour operations at Mount Alvernia Hospital, which include its nursing and housekeeping departments, and other crucial, high-traffic departments including the front office and the admissions department.

Commenting on the collaboration model behind BEAM, Mr James Loo, Chief Operating Officer of Y3 Technologies, said, “The hospital provided the healthcare domain knowledge while Y3 and Red Hat provided the technology expertise. Together, we created a flexible, efficient solution that breaks new ground in the healthcare industry.”

The BEAM solution comprises Red Hat Enterprise Linux, JBoss Enterprise Application Platform, Oracle databases, and Java Platform Enterprise Edition 2, running on a virtualised IBM PowerSeries 2 P6-570 server.

The JBoss Enterprise Service Oriented Architecture Platform which enables it to be integrated easily with the hospital’s existing IT infrastructure and resources, while the interface architecture allows for the design of an intuitive user interface that utilises Web 2.0 technologies, giving users quick access to the information that they need to perform their jobs more efficiently.