Ken Dion, on health care staffing solutions

By Bree LeMaire, MS, RN
March 1, 2004

How did you get into nursing? Information technology?

I ’m a third-generation firefighter and a second-generation nurse. My mother was a nurse; my father, two uncles and a grandfather were firefighters. I started out as a firefighter/paramedic. After working in the field, I wanted a more fixed schedule, but didn’t want to lose my skills. Emergency room nursing seemed a natural fit.

I’ve always had an interest in IT. My Boy Scout merit badge was in computers, which was long before the hard drive.

Today, I pride myself in being able to marry my clinical skills with IT and support the way nurses work rather than making them change to suit the technology.

I like to say I’m trilingual in that I talk with nurses and find out what they need, then speak with the technical folks and explain what we’re going to build and then put on my business hat and take our message to the CFO to explain the business benefits.

Where did your concept for shift bidding come from?

I worked with shift bidding as a firefighter/paramedic. It’s been part of the Decision Critical business plan since we conceived the company in 1995.

Organizations have gone to great lengths to meet nurses’ scheduling needs, but hard-to-fill shifts still remained. We’ve all heard the nightmares of an agency’s unqualified staff being sent to fill shifts.

Whether using Decision Critical’s learning management system or entering the qualifications of the nurse directly into the shift-bid system, the hospital ensures that the opportunity reaches only qualified nurses who can fill the need.

Considering that 80 percent of the health care is delivered by nurses, this can make staffing much more efficient. We strongly believe patient outcomes are improved by using internally qualified staff. There is also the potential for physician and patient satisfaction by using nurses already known.

Decision Critical offers products that any hospital can implement by launching a Web browser without the high cost and long startup time.

How does it work?

Shift bidding works the same as an online auction, only in reverse. The hospital sets the opening price for the shift, and then nurses come along and bid down the price.

Let’s say a schedule comes out a week or two before the shift date or even hours before when someone has called in sick. The hospital puts the open shift out to bid. Nurse No.1 might say I’ll work for less and puts in a bid, then nurse No.2 comes in and says I’ll work for less than that and puts in a bid. Nurse No.1 is notified via e-mail or pager of the current bid and given the option to resubmit at a lower bid.

These offers go out only to qualified nurses according to the data in the system. However, this process should not be limited just to nursing.

What has this done for nursing shortage?

All the literature indicates there is a shortage of working nurses, showing that nurses are maintaining their licenses, but not necessarily nursing. We hope our enabling technology will satisfy some of the autonomy issues, which contribute to the shortage. It can be a vehicle to bring nurses back to the bedside where they are so desperately needed.

Does Decision Critical have other products?

Our core product is the educational data repository. Like the electronic medical record, used to record everything that happens with a patient, we have used the same framework and applied it to education. We can provide and track education any place it occurs, from the rep that comes onto the unit to more formal classrooms.

“Educational Levels of Hospital Nurses and Surgical Patient Mortality” by Linda Aiken from JAMA 2003 identified the relationship between education and patient outcomes. Our technology allows an institution to have a comprehensive picture of a nurse’s education.

We are launching software that extends the capabilities of our learning management system to a personal data assistant, which a nurse can carry to the bedside.

It includes such items as the skills checklist. A preceptor later can download such a checklist and then upload the data to the employee’s file.

We want nurses to be successful in their work environment and thereby influence patient outcomes.

Any suggestions for nurse entrepreneurs?

Get out there and do it. Don’t be afraid to take credit for your work. If you’ve got an idea, pursue it. Nurses are at the frontlines. They see the needs, which in the long run can be opportunities for innovative products.

How many times have nurses invented something that stays inside the organization and then comes out with another’s name on it?